STEPHEN  Bo  WEEKS 

CLASS  OF  1886;  PH.D.  THE  JOHNS  HOPKINS  UNIVERSITY 

EJBIRAW 

OF  THE 

CNWElRSimY  OF  MORIH  CAR0MNA 
THE  WEEKS  COHIECTEON 

OF 

CAROUNIANA 


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UNIVERSITY  OF  N.C.  AT  CHAPEL  HILL 


00032193509 


This  book  must  not 
be  taken  from  the 
Library  building. 


THIS  TITLE  HAS.  BEEN  MICROFILMED 


Form  No.  471 

I 


THE  LIFE  WORTH  LIVING 


OTHER   BOOKS   BY 
THOMAS   DIXON,   Jr. 


THE   CLANSMAN 

THE   LEOPARD'S   SPOTS 

THE   ONE   WOMAN 


ONE    GREAT   PASSION   OF   MY   LIFE   WAS   THE    DREAM    OF    A 
BEAUTIFUL    HOME*' 


The 

Life  Worth  Living 

A  Personal  Experience 


By 

Thomas  Dixon,  jr. 

Author  of  "  The  Leopard's  Spots,"  "  The  Clansman,"  Etc. 


Illustrated  ivith  photographs  by  the  Author 


NEW   YORK 

DOUBLEDAY,  PAGE  &  COMPANY 

1905 


Copyright,  1905,  by 

Thomas  Dixon,  Jr. 

Published,  May,  1905 


All  rights  reserved,  including  that  of 
translation  into  foreign  languages^ 
including  the  Scandinavian. 


TO 

Kottian  anb  tir&omag 

MY    SONS    AND    COMRADES 
IN    THE    LIFE    WORTH    LIVING 


N 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTER 

FAbt 

I. 

Dreams  and  Disillusion 

I 

II. 

In  Old  Tidewater  Virginia 

8 

III. 

Beside  Beautiful  Waters    . 

16 

IV. 

The  Music  of  the  Seasons 

23 

V. 

The  Fellowship  of  Dogs     . 

29 

VI. 

Some  Sins  of  Nature 

4i 

VII. 

The  Shouts  of  Children      . 

52 

VIII. 

First  Lessons  in  Life 

64 

IX. 

Along  Shining  Shores 

72 

X. 

The  Breath  of  the  Southern  Seas 

89 

XI. 

In  the  Haunts  of  Wild  Fowl 

107 

XII. 

The  Frozen  Fountain 

130 

XIII. 

The  City's  Lambent  Flame 

135 

XIV. 

What  is  Life?     .... 

137 

vu 


LIST  OF  ILLUSTRATIONS 

"One  great  passion  of  my  life  was  the  dream  of 

a    beautiful    home  "...  Fnntuphce 

FACING    PAGE 

"Just  a  nineteen-foot  slit  in  a  block  of  scorched 

mud  with  a  brownstone  veneer"  .  .  6 
"A  stately  Colonial  home  two  hundred  years  old  "  8 
"The  Old  Dominion  steamer  has  an  artistic  little 

pier  on  the  upper  end  of  the  lawn  "  .  .10 
"In   the  high  hills   rise   cool  streams   of  fresh 

water    to    turn    our    mill-wheels"       .        .12 

"Its  great  hall" 14 

"The   grass   of   the   lawn   rolls   sheer   into   the 

dead  line  of  the  salt  tide  "       ....     16 

A   friend   from   the   barn 18 

"The  oaks  and  elms  I  love  best"  ...  20 
"Through  the  shadows  of  the  trees  the  waters 

gleam" 22 

The  author  at  work  in  his  cabin  ....  24 
"The  drives  in  summer  along  the  country  roads 

are  of  surprising  beauty"  ....  26 
"The  lawn  is  never  quite  bare"  ...  28 
"The  dog  is  the  most  faithful,  the  most  lovable, 

the  most  companionable  of  all  the  animals 

that  associate  with  man"  ....  30 
ix 


LIST  OF  ILLUSTRATIONS-cw/W 


FACING    PAGE 


Bob  on  a  close  point 32 

The  log-cabin  study  on  the  edge  of  the  lawn  34 
Sailor    and    the    boys    in    private    theatricals — 

"The  Mystery  of  Sleep"       ....     38 

The    inevitable 48 

"We  have  a  beautifully  curved  sand  beach  on  the 

lawn" 54 

"All  have  saddles  and  ride  like  veteran  cavalry- 
men"   56 

"Another  pleasure  of  my  boys  is  the  work  of 

the  trapper" 58 

"I  believe  in  the  gun  for  a  normal  boy"  .  .  60 
"The  first  man  was  a  hunter"  .  .  .  .62 
"He  learns  that  winds  and  tides  have  souls"  66 
"Away  over  the  endless  marsh"  ...  78 
"Place  our  decoys  on  the  edge  of  the  receding 

surf" 86 

"Sometimes  the  sky  is  black  with  them"       .     88 

The  Dixie 102 

"I  never  knew  how  much  beautiful  weather  there 

was  in  winter" 198 

"George  and  I  crouched  among  them"       .       .124 
"We  are  homeward  bound  now,  with  her  big 
yacht  ensign  set  aft  and  her  colours  at  her 

masthead" 128 

"The  ermine  robe  of  the  North"       .       _       -   130 


THE  LIFE  WORTH  LIVING 


The    Life    Worth    Living 

CHAPTER  I 
Dreams  and  Disillusion 

Whether  life  is  really  worth  living  depends 
largely  on  where  you  try  to  live  it. 

The  one  great  passion  of  my  life  was  the 
dream  of  a  beautiful  home.  This  home- 
dream  crept  slowly  into  the  soul  long  before 
the  face  of  a  woman  came  to  smile  at  all  other 
hopes  and  fears.  It  required  no  pleading  to 
make  her  feel  its  beauty.  She,  too,  had  seen 
it  in  a  vision  long  ago.  Then  tiny  baby 
feet  came  trooping  into  a  cottage  before 
the  money  was  in  the  bank  to  build  this 

dream. 

Another  passion  of  my  boyhood  was  the 


2  The  Life  Worth  Living 

hope  of  life  in  a  great  city.  From  the  dis- 
tance of  the  farm  this  vision  was  radiant 
with  the  splendours  of  wealth  and  power.  I 
dreamed  of  its  boulevards,  its  parks,  its 
palatial  homes,  and  its  gleaming  lights.  The 
lambent  flame  of  its  distant  life  filled  the 
horizon  with  the  glory  of  an  endless  sunrise. 

So  in  the  natural  course  of  events  New 
York  swept  us  into  its  seething  tide. 

We  struggled  bravely  to  save  both  these 
dreams.  First  we  rented  a  modest  little  slit- 
in-a-wall  fourteen  feet  wide,  far  uptown,  for 
which  we  paid  one  thousand  dollars  to  the 
landlord  annually,  and  five  hundred,  more  or 
less,  to  the  elevated  road  for  the  right  to  be 
jabbed  in  the  ribs  while  we  held  to  a  strap  to 
get  there. 

Then  we  tried  a  nice  "airy  apartment" 
downtown.  It  had  six  "rooms."  One 
opened  on  the  street,  four  looked  down  into 
a  dark  well,  and  the  kitchen  opened  on  an 
iron  grillwork  that  gave  it  the  appearance 


Dreams  and  Disillusion  3 

of  a  jail.  The  children  were  omnipotent 
and  omnipresent.  By  the  record  in  the 
family  Bible  we  had  only  three.  But  they 
managed  to  get  into  every  room  in  that  flat 
at  the  same  minute,  and  their  name  was 
legion. 

We  tried  boarding  with  a  nice  old  lady 
who  had  an  eye  that  could  chill  the  most 
turbulent  child  into  silence.  Our  little  girl 
took  pneumonia,  and  we  had  two  doctors 
and  two  trained  nurses  in  that  boarding 
house  for  six  weeks. 

Then  the  suburban  home.  We  bought  a 
vacant  lot,  with  a  waterfront  of  sixty  feet, 
at  Bensonhurst,  and  built  on  it.  When  fin- 
ished it  cost  sixteen  thousand  dollars,  and  it 
took  most  of  the  time  of  one  man  to  keep 
the  tin  cans,  driftwood,  dead  cats  and  dogs 
off  that  sixty  feet  of  waterfront. 

The  first  time  I  tried  to  go  home  on  Sun- 
day, I  got  jammed  in  a  cheerful  crowd  that 
started  to  Coney  Island  by  way  of  Benson- 


4  The  Life  Worth  Living 

hurst,  gave  it  up  after  two  hours,  and  didn't 
go  home  till  morning.  The  first  big  snow- 
storm that  came  in  the  winter  buried  the 
trolley  lines,  and  I  didn't  see  my  wife  and 
children  for  two  days.  As  the  telephone 
wires  were  down  I  could  only  hope  for  the 
best.  I  sold  the  place  to  a  bigger  fool,  after 
a  patient  search  of  four  wTeeks  for  him.  The 
ease  with  which  I  got  out  of  that  house,  with 
only  the  loss  of  the  carpets  and  window 
shades,  I  shall  always  regard  as  a  mark  of 
the  special  favour  of  God. 

I  bought  a  five-acre  place  on  Staten  Island 
on  the  top  of  the  highest  hill.  It  had  a 
grand  view  of  the  sea,  Sandy  Hook  and  the 
shipping.  The  mosquitoes  were  so  thick,  so 
enormous,  and  so  venomous,  that  they  could 
attack  and  kill  a  horse  if  left  to  their  mercy. 
Their  fang  was  so  poisonous  that  when  they 
bit  one  of  our  boys  his  little  legs  and  arms 
would  swell  as  though  a  snake  had  struck 
him;    and  at  the  end  of  the  summer  he 


Dreams  and  Disillusion  5 

drooped  into  a  deadly  malarial  fever  from 
which  we  barely  saved  him  alive,  but  with 
both  legs  paralyzed  for  life.  With  the 
shadow  of  this  sorrow  darkening  the  world, 
we  sold  the  place  to  the  first  bidder,  and  tear- 
fully returned  to  the  city. 

By  this  time  we  were  convinced  that  the 
only  way  to  really  live  in  New  York  was  to 
buy  a  decent  home  near  Central  Park,  what- 
ever the  cost,  and  settle  for  life.  We  found 
it  after  a  search  of  two  months.  It  was 
located  on  West  Ninety-fourth  Street,  within 
the  block  facing  the  park. 

We  had  a  delightful  time  spending  a  thou- 
sand dollars  decorating  it  to  our  own  taste. 
It  was  a  neat  brownstone  front,  nineteen  feet 
wide,  in  a  solid  block  of  similar  houses.  It 
had  a  high  stoop,  iron  bars  on  the  basement 
windows  through  which  we  looked  from  the 
dining  table,  and  a  kitchen  behind  this 
dining-room  opening  into  the  paved  cat-yard 
19  x  20.     The  floor  above  contained  a  narrow 


6  The  Life  Worth  Living 

hall,  parlour  and  library.  The  next  story  had 
two  bedrooms  and  a  bathroom,  and  the  top 
floor  had  two  "large"  rooms  and  two  small 
ones  inside.  The  wood  was  hard,  the  man- 
tels and  chandeliers  pretty,  the  fireplaces 
poetic  looking,  with  iron  logs  to  imitate 
wood,  and  it  cost  us  twenty-five  thousand 
dollars. 

The  taxes,  insurance  and  repairs  still  held 
a  fixed  charge  on  the  place  of  about  $350 
annually.  A  house  in  New  York  is  the 
easiest  thing  a  tax-gatherer  has  to  manage. 
Only  one  man  in  ten  ever  dares  to  own  one. 
The  others  keep  moving. 

Within  six  months  this  dream  had  faded. 

Our  home  was  just  a  nineteen-foot  slit  in  a 
block  of  scorched  mud  with  a  brownstone 
veneer  in  front.  Our  children  were  penned 
in  its  narrow  prison  walls  through  the  long 
winters,  and  forbidden  to  walk  on  the  grass 
in  the  cold,  dreary  spring.  The  doctor  came 
to  see  us  every  week. 


'JUST  A  NINETEEN-FOOT  SLIT  IN  A  BLOCK  OF  SCORCHED  MUD  WITH  A 
BROWNSTONE    VENEER  " 


Dreams  and  Disillusion  7 

The  disillusioning  was  complete.  We  had 
stayed  in  New  York  eleven  years,  moved 
twelve  times,  worn  out  three  sets  of  house- 
hold goods,  and  aided  in  the  revival  of  the 
carpet  trade,  before  we  found  out  what 
ailed  us. 

At  last  we  knew  that  the  stamping-ground 
of  the  great  herd  might  be  a  good  place 
for  trade,  but  that  God  never  meant  for 
man  to  build  a  home  and  rear  children  in  it. 

And  then  the  longing  for  the  country  life 
in  which  we  had  both  been  reared  came  over 
us  with  resistless  power.  The  smell  of  green 
fields  and  wild  flowers,  the  breath  of  the  open 
sea,  the  music  of  beautiful  waters,  the  quiet 
of  woodland  roads,  the  kindly  eyes  of  ani- 
mals we  had  known,  the  memory  of  sun  and 
moon  and  star  long  lost  in  the  glare  of  elec- 
tric lights,  began  to  call.  We  sat  down  in 
our  little  narrow  parlour,  with  its  cast-iron 
firelogs  and  porcelain  taper  chandeliers,  and 
cried  over  it  all. 


CHAPTER  II 
In  Old  Tidewater  Virginia. 

We  moved  to  Tidewater  Virginia,  the 
home  of  Captain  John  Smith,  the  oldest 
settlement  in  America  and  yet  the  most 
primitive,  the  most  beautiful  and  least 
known  spot  in  our  continent — a  bit  of  wild 
nature  slumbering  beside  the  pathway  of  the 
rushing  life  of  the  Atlantic  seaboard. 

Here  we  realized  the  first  dream  of  life,  a 
stately  Colonial  home  two  hundred  years 
old,  called  Elmington  Manor,  situa'ed  on  the 
shores  of  the  Chesapeake  Bay.  Its  ivory 
pillars  flash  their  welcome  from  both  sides  of 
the  house  through  the  shadows  of  huge  trees 
that  shade  its  wide  lawn. 

The  farm  has  five  hundred  acres,  three 
hundred  and  fifty  under  cultivation  and  one 


In  Old  Tidewater  Virginia  9 

hundred  and  fifty  in  woods.  We  keep 
eleven  horses,  six  cows,  a  dozen  sheep,  four 
bird-dogs,  chickens,  ducks  and  turkeys.  We 
have  a  two-acre  garden  with  greenhouse  for 
winter  vegetables,  an  acre  of  strawberries, 
an  acre  of  raspberries  and  dewberries  and 
two  acres  in  grapes;  an  old  orchard  and  a 
young  one  with  all  the  fruits  of  the  temper- 
ate climate ;  and  a  mile  water  front  with  full 
riparian  rights. 

The  Old  Dominion  steamer  has  an  artistic 
little  pier  on  the  upper  end  of  the  lawn, 
which  gives  us  daily  mail  and  traffic  with 
Old  Point  and  Norfolk  and  the  outside 
world.  There  are  no  railroads  in  the  three 
counties  of  Gloucester,  Matthews  and  Mid- 
dlesex. We  live  in  Gloucester,  and  around 
us  on  the  beautiful  landlocked  arm  of  the 
Chesapeake  called  North  River  we  see  from 
our  porch  fourteen  water-front  homes. 
These  three  counties  are  intersected  by  a 
network  of  tide  rivers  and  creeks,  like  the 


io  The  Life  Worth  Living 

veins  of  a  leaf,  making  it  a  veritable  rural 
Venice. 

Back  two  miles  in  the  high  hills  rise  cool 
streams  of  fresh  water  to  turn  our  mill- 
wheels  and  pour  their  new  life  into  the  sea, 
giving  us  the  finest  oysters  in  the  world.  We 
have  twenty-five  acres  of  these  oyster  grounds 
in  front  of  our  home. 

The  fields  are  full  of  quail.  They  nest  in 
the  garden  and  orchard  and  sometimes  mix 
with  the  chickens ;  while  in  unbroken  reaches 
of  three  thousand  acres  of  forests  roam  flocks 
of  wild  turkeys  whose  ancestors  furnished 
food  and  sport  for  Powhatan,  Pocahontas 
and  Captain  Smith. 

The  waters  are  full  of  fish,  and  our  baby 
boy  can  catch  enough  for  dinner  within  a 
hundred  yards  of  the  house  any  day  from 
the  first  of  May  till  the  first  of  November. 
In  the  winter  the  wild  ducks,  geese  and  brant 
give  the  sport  of  kings. 

We  keep  a  pen  full  of  diamond-back  ter- 

3605 


In  Old  Tidewater  Virginia  n 

rapin  as  we  keep  a  pen  of  pigs,  and  fatten  them 
on  crabs.  Crabs  and  clams  are  so  plentiful 
that  they  are  considered  a  very  plebeian  diet. 
We  keep  a  naphtha  launch,  two  small  sail- 
boats, three  rowboats  and  a  schooner  yacht. 

I  had  always  desired  a  home  that  had  some 
association  with  history  and  yet  one  on  which 
I  might  stamp  the  imprint  of  my  own  mind. 
Elmington  Manor  fulfilled  both  these  desires. 
The  house,  when  we  bought  the  estate,  was 
simply  a  square  brick  structure  finished  with 
Portland  cement  and  painted  brown.  It 
is  beautifully  situated  on  a  peninsula  lawn 
of  fifteen  acres.  From  the  land  side  the 
avenue  drive  stretches  away  from  the  gate 
through  giant  trees  two  miles  to  the  hills  and 
the  country  road.  On  the  water  side  it  looks 
majestically  out  to  sea  over  a  sunny  stretch 
of  greensward  dotted  with  holly  and  flower- 
ing shrubs. 

Its  roots  are  deep  set  in  Colonial  history. 
Its  broad  acres  were  a  Crown  grant  two  hun- 


12  The  Life  Worth  Living 

dred  years  ago.  A  short  drive  to  the  south 
is  the  village  of  Yorktown,  the  scene  of  the 
siege  and  surrender  of  Lord  Cornwallis  to 
Washington  and  our  French  allies.  On  this 
side  the  York  River  stands  towering  old 
Rosewell,  the  most  palatial  country  estab- 
lishment in  America  when  built  by  the  Pages. 
Near  Rosewell  is  the  ancient  chimney  of  the 
Indian  emperor,  Powhatan.  This  chimney 
was  built  for  Powhatan  under  the  direction 
of  Captain  John  Smith's  colonists.  Across 
the  York  but  a  few  miles  from  us  are  old 
Williamsburg  and  Jamestown. 

The  house  was  built  by  Dr.  John  Prosser 
Tabb,  fifty-seven  years  ago,  at  that  time 
the  richest  and  most  influential  man  in  the 
county.  Its  walls  contain  the  brick  from 
the  old  house  built  in  the  earliest  Colonial 
days. 

These  walls  are  three  feet  thick.  The 
house  is  three  and  a  half  stories  high  and 
contains    thirty-two    rooms.     The    hall     is 


"in  the  high  hills  rise  cool  streams  of  fresh  water  to  turn 

our  mill-wheels" 


In  Old  Tidewater  Virginia  13 

twenty  feet  wide,  and  thirty-five  feet  deep; 
and  from  its  rear  circular  wall  the  winding 
mahogany  stair  sweeps  gracefully  up  three 
stories  into  the  gallery  of  the  observatory. 

There  is  not  a  shoddy  piece  of  work  in  it 
from  cellar  to  attic.  The  mahogany  rails 
and  spindles  are  the  finest  finished  hand- 
work, the  window  and  door  sills  are  of  mas- 
sive Italian  marble,  and  the  hard  pine  floors 
so  evenly  and  smoothly  laid  they  will  hold 
water.  The  floors  are  laid  on  oak  sleepers 
set  ten  inches  apart,  and  are  back-plastered 
and  sand-ballasted. 

Hundreds  of  slaves  aided  the  skilled  work- 
men in  its  erection.  Its  straight,  massive, 
square  lines  gave  me  the  opportunity  to 
carry  out  my  dream  of  a  Colonial  home.  It 
only  required  the  addition  on  both  sides  of 
the  Greek  fagades  with  the  pillars,  and  it  was 
done. 

We  had  men  at  work  on  the  construction 
of  these  columns  who  never  saw  a  locomo- 


14  The  Live  Worth  Living 

tive, — men  of  family  who  own  their  homes. 

I  put  in  a  system  of  waterworks,  with 
windmill  for  power,  four  bathrooms,  and  a 
complete  system  of  sewerage  into  tidewater. 
An  acetylene  gas  plant  gives  us  finer  lights 
than  electricity  and  for  less  cost  than  city  gas. 
We  rummaged  through  the  junk  shops  of 
New  York  and  dragged  out  a  complete  set 
of  massive  brass  chandeliers,  all  over  fifty 
years  old  in  pattern,  had  them  cleaned  at  the 
factory,  and  they  look  as  if  they  had  been 
built  into  the  house  originally. 

Twelve  rooms  have  open  grate  fires,  and 
sufficient  heat  for  all  the  spaces  was  secured 
by  placing  two  tubular  hot-air  furnaces  in 
the  basement.  Our  winters  are  usually  so 
mild  that  roses  blossom  in  the  flower-garden 
in  December. 

I  had  dreamed  this  complete  from  the 
moment  I  saw  the  house.  The  actual  doing 
of  the  thing  was  a  revelation  and  a  liberal 
education.     I  figured  on  $3,000  for  the  job  of 


In  Old  Tidewater  Virginia  15 

painting,  decorating,  water,  heat,  and  mod- 
ern conveniences. 

The  plumbing  alone  cost  $2,350!  And  I 
got  good  value  for  the  money.  The  bills 
aggregated  $7,500. 

But  when  it  was  done,  it  was  a  joy  to  look 
at  it.  The  effect  was  massive  and  dignified, 
and  yet  homelike  and  inviting.  We  had 
something  to  show  for  our  money,  and,  what 
was  a  great  deal  better,  we  had  something 
that  would  stand  the  test  of  time.  Its  great 
hall  and  grand  old  rooms  with  their  lofty 
ceilings  give  meaning  and  dignity  to  daily 
life,  and  their  memories  link  us  in  fellowship 
and  sympathy  to  a  mighty  past. 

And  we  got  it  all  for  nineteen  feet  of 
scorched  mud  in  New  York. 


CHAPTER  III 
Beside  Beautiful  Waters 

It  is  the  situation  of  a  home  that  makes  or 
mars  it.  Spend  a  million  dollars  on  a  palace, 
locate  it  poorly,  and  it  is  lost.  You  may 
build  with  all  the  art  that  genius  and  wealth 
can  command,  and  if  you  build  in  an  un- 
healthful  climate  or  near  a  fish  factory,  art 
and  wealth  and  genius  have  failed. 

The  one  thing  that  makes  New  York  im- 
possible for  a  real  home  is  the  certainty  that 
sooner  or  later  a  hotel,  a  flat,  a  store,  a 
church,  a  factory,  a  stable  or  a  saloon  will  be 
located  near  you.  It  is  only  a  question  of 
time  when  the  palaces  of  millionaires  are 
moved  by  these  forces. 

The  thing  which  charmed  me  first  with  the 
spot  in  Tidewater  Virginia  which  I  selected, 


'THE  GRASS  OF  THE  LAWN  ROLLS  SHEER  INTO  THE  DEAD  LINE  OF  THE 

SALT   TIDE" 


Beside  Beautiful  Waters  17 

is  the  fact  of  its  perfect  healthfulness  and 
security  from  nuisance. 

The  lawn  is  high  ground  rising  abruptly 
from  eight  to  ten  feet  from  the  water  line,  a 
stiff  clay  soil  mixed  with  sand,  with  no  marsh 
grass  or  mosquito  pools.  The  grass  of  the 
lawn  rolls  sheer  into  the  dead  line  of  the  salt 
tide.  There  are  mosquitoes  and  malaria  in 
Tidewater  Virginia  if  you  choose  their  loca- 
tion. The  lawn  of  Elmington  Manor  is  a 
beautiful  little  peninsula  behind  which 
stretches  the  estate  of  five  hundred  acres 
into  the  hills. 

This  little  peninsula  juts  out  into  the 
waters  of  the  river  at  the  head  of  its 
navigable  channel,  just  where  the  current 
makes  a  sharp  bend  to  the  right  and  two 
large  creeks  sweep  inland  to  the  left,  giving 
views  of  the  water  from  every  window  in 
the  house  and  from  every  point  at  which 
a  rustic  seat  may  be  placed  on  the  lawn. 
The  creek  flows  gracefully  through  the  lawn 


1 8  The  Life  Worth  Living 

and    forms  a    landlocked    harbor    for    our 
boats. 

The  water  front  commands  an  entran- 
cing view.  Straight  before,  two  miles  wide, 
stretches  the  North  River  southward  until 
lost  in  the  open  sea  of  the  Chesapeake 
Bay  and  Atlantic  Ocean.  The  shores  are 
marked  with  towering  trees  clustering  around 
their  old  homesteads. 

The  things  which  fascinate  me  above  all 
others  are  our  trees. 

The  place  was  named  "Elmington"  from 
its  giant  elms.  On  the  lawn  now  are  three 
hundred  and  ninety  trees,  comprising  thirty- 
seven  varieties.  About  half  of  them  are  the 
evergreens,  holly,  pine,  cedar  and  magnolia. 
Among  them  are  water  oaks  four  feet  in 
diameter,  lifting  their  immense  limbs  clothed 
in  shimmering  green  far  above  the  roof  of 
the  house. 

There  is  no  sameness  anywhere.  The 
lawn  is  level   only   on   two   sides.      On  the 


;*£.* 


M$m 


A    FRIEND    FROM    THE    BARN 


Beside  Beautiful  Waters  19 

other  sides  are  little  hills  and  valleys  and 
long  open  reaches  of  sunlit  turf.  A  hundred 
cedars  tower  in  line  along  the  northern  and 
western  sides  as  guarding  sentinels  against 
the  winds  of  winter.  Two  big  magnolias, 
robed  in  everlasting  green,  stand  beside  the 
white  pillars  on  the  front  porch  and  blossom 
all  summer. 

On  the  water  side  the  hollies  cast  their 
dense  shade  in  summer  and  lift  triumphantly 
their  bouquets  of  scarlet  berry  and  green 
leaves  through  the  fiercest  storms  of  winter. 

A  mockingbird  builds  every  summer  in 
the  flowering  holly  which  we  see  on  the  water's 
edge  from  the  dining-room  window,  while 
another  nests  in  the  rosebush  nearby,  and 
from  every  shrub  and  tree  the  chatter  and 
song  of  an  army  of  feathered  musicians  fill 
the  air  with  melody. 

We  have  nothing  artificial,  forced  or  cul- 
tivated— only  the  trees,  hardy  shrubs,  grass 
and  wild  flowers. 


20  The  Life  Worth  Living 

Our  friends  from  the  barn  with  their  babies 
often  roam  over  the  lawn,  and  their  fellow- 
ship more  than  pays  for  any  annoyances 
their  presence  may  cause.  They  drink  grace- 
fully at  our  mermaid  fountain  and  seem  to 
think  her  bronze  figure  was  cast  and  set  there 
to  give  them  water.     And  so  it  was. 

In  early  spring  the  buttercups  carpet 
every  inch  of  earth  in  gorgeous  yellow,  while 
the  jonquils  lift  their  flame  about  the  foun- 
tain's rim. 

The  buttercups  stay  a  month,  and  then 
forget-me-nots,  clover  and  daisies  add  their 
white  and  blue.  We  have  a  garden  for  the 
cultivated  flowers.  But  I  confess  I've  given 
my  heart  to  the  wild  flowers  of  the  lawn. 
They  ask  nothing  and  give  everything. 

The  oaks  and  elms  I  love  best  of  all  the 
trees,  especially  the  water  oaks.  When  tired 
of  study,  I  stroll  beneath  their  dark  shadows, 
while  their  satin  leaves  flash  above  in  the  sun 
like  so  many  swinging  diamonds,  lie    down 


THE  OAKS  AND  ELMS  I  LOVE  BEST 


Beside  Beautiful  Waters  21 

« 

on  the  grass,  and  rest.  Ah,  such  rest,  with 
my  beloved  near! 

The  rush  and  roar  and  stupid  din  of  the 
city  I  remember  only  as  a  fevered  dream.  I 
am  akin  to  all  life.  The  earth  beneath  is  soft 
and  tender  as  the  touch  of  a  mother,  and 
these  oaks  that  tower  above  me  are  my  broth- 
ers. They  have  been  tried  as  I  have  been 
tried.  Their  limbs  have  wrestled  with  the 
furies  that  rode  on  the  wings  of  storms  and 
have  conquered.  Their  fibre  is  strong  be- 
cause they  have  suffered.  The  last  storm 
twisted  off  the  top  of  a  mulberry  and  hurled 
it  to  the  ground.  But  the  oaks  laughed  for 
sheer  joy  in  their  strength  when  the  wind 
was  fiercest.  I  love  them  because  they  are 
strong.  I  hear  them  at  night  softly  sighing 
when  the  wind  is  gentle.  They  are  telling 
the  others  about  them  to  be  not  afraid,  for 
they  have  looked  far  out  to  sea  and  no  storm 
is  near. 

Through  the  shadows  of  the  trees  the 
waters  gleam. 


22  The  Life  Worth  Living 

How  any  man  can  build  his  home  away 
from  water  so  long  as  there  is  a  water  front 
left  is  something  I  cannot  understand.  The 
house  is  located  just  two  hundred  feet  from 
the  river's  edge  from  one  corner  of  the  porch, 
and  from  the  other  corner  the  lawn  stretches 
away  into  a  reach  of  three  hundred  yards  of 
open  greensward  before  it  merges  into  the  tide. 

This  flashing  glory  of  opal,  emerald,  and 
turquoise  water,  changing  its  tint  with  every 
passing  cloud  and  breath  of  wind,  reflecting 
every  mood  of  sky  and  shore,  with  each  white- 
winged  sail  that  skims  its  surface — all  now 
are  of  the  rhythm  of  our  very  life.  The  storm, 
with  its  ten  thousand  whitecaps  dancing  and 
foaming  and  thundering  on  the  shore,  the 
mirrored  pictures  of  the  calm,  the  endless 
panorama  of  sun  and  moon  and  star  are  ours 
for  the  lifting  of  the  eye. 

And  we  got  it  all  in  exchange  for  a  few 
feet  of  scorched  mud,  and  a  cement  cat-yard 
19  x  20. 


"through  the  shadows  of  the  trees  the  waters  gleam 


CHAPTER  IV 
The  Music  of  the  Seasons 

Old  Tidewater  Virginia  is  the  ideal  spot 
in  America  for  a  home  all  the  year  round. 
Northern  people  have  a  very  erroneous  idea 
of  the  heat  of  its  summers.  I  have  spent 
summers  at  Gloucester,  Massachusetts,  on 
Long  Island,  and  the  Jersey  coast ;  but  there 
is  no  place  on  the  Atlantic  that  compares  in 
comfort  to  the  shores  of  Old  Virginia.  The 
Gulf  Stream,  which  almost  touches  the 
beaches  here,  maintains  its  temperature  of 
70  the  year  round.  In  winter  it  tempers  the 
cold,  and  in  summer  it  lowers  the  heat.  We 
have  the  most  even  temperature  to  be  found 
in  the  East. 

We  have  long,  beautiful  springs.  Winter 
never  lingers  in  the  lap  of  spring  'until  it 


24  The  Life  Worth  Living 

creates  talk.'  The  earth  seems  alive  with 
every  species  of  early  wild  flowers. 

The  vegetable  garden  is  a  source  of  endless 
pleasure.  We  plant  peas  in  January,  and 
cabbage  and  lettuce  grow  all  winter. 

There  is  something  about  planting  seeds, 
watching  them  sprout  and  grow,  that  links 
one  with  the  creative  process. 

Production  is  communion  with  God,  how- 
ever stoutly  the  dogmatist  may  deny  it. 

I  plant  the  seed  in  the  soft  warm  earth  and 
feel  the  glow  of  creative  joy.  I  have  joined 
with  God  in  giving  life,  and  when  I  reap  my 
harvest,  I  join  with  him  in  taking  it  again. 

There  is  not  a  month  in  the  year  that  our 
garden  will  not  grow  the  hardy  vegetables, 
and  from  March  to  November  it  grows  every- 
thing that  flourishes  this  side  the  tropics. 
Celery  will  keep  all  winter  bedded  in  the 
ground  where  it  grows. 

The  spring  calls  the  sportsman  as  loudly  as 
the  fall. 


THE    AUTHOR    AT    WORK    IN    HIS    CABIN 


The  Music  of  the  Seasons  25 

The  fishing  is  fine,  and  the  shore  birds, 
curlew,  snipe  and  plover,  come  in  myriads  in 
April  and  May  and  spend  six  weeks  getting 
fat  as  they  migrate  northward.  They  have 
raised  their  young  in  the  winter,  far  south, 
and  spring  is  the  proper  season  to  kill  them 
for  food.  They  leave  in  the  latter  part  of 
May  and  stop  again  as  they  return  south- 
ward in  July  and  August.  They  do  not  nest 
or  stay  permanently  in  our  territory.  Tide- 
water Virginia  is  simply  their  rich  feeding 
ground. 

In  summer  we  have  delightful  breezes  from 
every  point  of  the  compass.  The  long  sweep 
inland  of  the  Chesapeake  Bay  for  200  miles 
makes  a  hot  land  breeze  impossible.  The 
land  breezes  on  the  coast  of  New  Jersey  are 
insufferable  to  me.  Here  is  water,  water 
everywhere,  and  the  land  seems  always  the 
least  significant  feature  of  the  picture  Nature 
presents. 

The  fruits  of  the  semi-tropical  zone  all  grow 


26  The  Life  Worth  Living 

luxuriantly.      Gloucester  county   is   famous 
for  its  fine  watermelons  and  cantaloupes. 

The  drives  in  summer  along  the  country 
roads  are  of  surprising  beauty.  The  wild 
grapevines  festoon  its  dense  woods  and  hang 
far  out  over  the  roadway.  Even  at  noon  the 
wide  double-track  highway  is  sheltered  by 
these  cooling  shadows. 

The  summers  offer  the  sportsman  the  same 
flight  of  migratory  shore  birds  as  spring,  and 
adds  to  them  some  special  varieties. 

Autumn  clothes  field  and  forest  with  a  new 
and  peculiar  glory.  Here  we  have  the  long 
Indian  Summer  in  September  and  October. 
Italy  never  saw  such  skies,  and  the  glorious 
sunlight  and  peace  that  flood  the  earth  in 
these  days  cannot  be  revealed  by  words. 
October  is  the  only  month  when  the  wind- 
mill ever  fails  for  two  days  to  turn.  Nature 
seems  to  hold  her  breath  for  sheer  joy. 
Each  day  is  a  miracle  of  beauty — clear  skies, 
warm  genial  sun,  crisp  pure  air,  with  every 


THE    DRIVES    IN    SUMMER   ALONG   THE    COUNTRY   ROADS   ARE    OF 
SURPRISING    BEAUTY" 


The  Music  of  the  Seasons  27 

tree  that  sheds  its  leaf  robed  in  scarlet  and 
purple  flame. 

It  is  hard  to  tell  when  our  woods  are  most 
beautiful:  in  spring,  with  the  dogwood  blos- 
soms so  thick  they  look  as  if  a  snowstorm 
had  covered  their  tender  green,  or  in  October, 
when  the  holly,  as  thick  as  the  dogwood,  lifts 
its  great  bouquets  of  glistening  evergreen 
with  scarlet  berries  amid  the  red  and  purple 
splendour  of  the  oak  and  hickory,  beech  and 
maple,  poplar  and  chestnut. 

I  confess  a  special  love  for  our  winters. 
Here  the  fire  of  the  sun  never  dies.  It  warms 
and  thrills  even  in  February.  The  lawn  is 
never  quite  bare.  When  the  winds  of  No- 
vember have  swept  clean  the  great  limbs  of 
oak  and  elm,  the  magnolia,  cedar  and  holly 
smile  still  into  the  face  of  the  sun.  I  love 
these  big  naked  trees,  too.  To  me  their  tall 
nymph-like  limbs  seem  fashioned  by  some 
master  artist  of  the  nude  against  the  azure 
background  of  the  sky. 


28  The  Life  Worth  Living 

The  roads  in  winter,  that  stretch  through 
solemn  aisles  of  towering  pines,  are  as  beau- 
tiful to  me  as  the  embowered  drives  of  sum- 
mer. 

I  love  the  ragged  winter  lines  of  the  creek 
where  the  quail  shelter  in  the  tall  grass  at  the 
water's  edge  ready  to  cross  to  the  woods  if 
hard  pressed. 

The  cry  of  the  wild  duck  and  brant  and 
the  honk  of  the  goose  thrill  the  heart  of  the 
huntsman  and  call  to  the  sport  of  kings. 

There  is  not  a  day  in  the  calendar  from  the 
first  of  January  to  the  thirty-first  of  Decem- 
ber that  there  is  not  good  fishing  or  hunting, 
or  both,  in  Tidewater  Virginia. 

On  long  winter  nights  we  sit  beside  a  roar-' 
ing  log  fire,  read  and  dream,  listen  to  music, 
or  chat  with  our  kindly  neighbours.  Our 
neighbours  are  never  in  a  hurry.  They  have 
more  time  than  money,  and  spend  it  more 
freely.  They  really  live,  and  we  have  fallen 
into  their  friendly  ways. 


CHAPTER  V 

The  Fellowship  of  Dogs 

Perhaps  the  most  pitiful  thing  about  the 
stunted  life  of  a  man  or  a  boy  in  the  city,  is 
the  lack  of  healthy  dog  comradeship. 

The  cynic  who  said,  "The  more  I  see  of 
men  the  better  I  like  dogs,"  was  speaking  of 
men  who  had  degenerated  for  the  lack  of  the 
friendship  and  personal  sympathy  of  dogs. 

The  dog  is  the  most  faithful,  the  most 
lovable,  the  most  companionable  of  all  the 
animals  that  associate  with  man,  and  man 
is  always  made  nobler  by  his  friendship. 

Let  no  fool  philosopher  tell  me  a  dog  can't 
think,  reason,  love,  hate,  fear,  laugh  and  cry 
as  I  do.     I  know  better. 

When  I  reached  home  the  other  day  from  a 
long  lecture  tour,   my  oldest  setter  hadn't 


30  The  Life  Worth  hiving 

been  out  of  the  lawn  for  two  weeks.  She 
scorned  to  follow  the  carriage  and  point  birds 
for  women  and  children,  who  were  incapable 
of  appreciating  her  genius.  But  when  I 
came — such  capers,  such  exclamations  of 
love  and  joy!  She  cried — literally  cried  big 
tears  of  joy — laid  her  head  against  mine,  and 
between  her  sobs  told  me  I  had  missed  the 
greatest  quail  season  ever  known  in  Virginia. 
She  said  the  quail  were  so  thick  they  were 
coming  into  the  yard,  and  that  nobody  had 
sense  enough  to  go  after  them.  She  begged 
me  to  go  outside  the  gate  with  her,  in  season 
or  out,  she  didn't  care,  and  she  would  show 
me. 

When  I  drove  out  with  my  wife,  Becky 
was  simply  beside  herself  wTith  joy.  She 
danced  and  capered  around  the  carriage  and 
said  with  a  smile : 

"Now  just  watch  me.  I'll  show  you  a 
dozen  between  here  and  the  county  road!" 

We  had  barely  passed  through  the  gate, 


\.,  :•    '     ? 

1                                                               •                  * '        - 

9  l  .«•'.. 

......    -A         ■ 

THE   DOG  IS  THE  MOST  FAITHFUL,  THE   MOST  LOVABLE,  THE    MOST 
COMPANIONABLE  OF  ALL  THE  ANIMALS  THAT  ASSOCIATE  WITH  MAN" 


The  Fellowship  of  Dogs  31 

when  she  circled  gracefully  through  the 
strawberry  patch,  made  a  beautiful  point, 
turned  her  head  toward  the  carriage,  grinned, 
switched  her  tail  and  said:  "I  told  you  so! 
Look  at  this!" 

When  I  flushed  the  birds  she  sailed  swiftly 
away  to  the  next  field  a  hundred  yards  far- 
ther, and  before  we  reached  the  point  in  the 
road  she  had  rounded  up  more  birds. 

When  I  flushed  them,  she  looked  up  at  me, 
smiled  and  said  with  a  sigh: 

"You  see  they  are  all  in  pairs  now — it's 
too  late.  I  nearly  died  of  a  broken  heart 
because  you  didn't  come  in  time.  I  lost  my 
appetite  and  all  interest  in  life  and  wouldn't 
go  out  of  the  yard.  You  will  not  stay  away 
so  long  again,  will  you?" 

I  assured  her  that  I  had  already  arranged 
my  lecture-trips  season  so  that  I  could  be  with 
her  the  month  of  November  and  December, 
and  she  wagged  her  tail  and  smiled. 

One  of  the  smartest  things  I  ever  knew 


2,2  The  Life  Worth  Living 

Becky  to  do  was  to  take  hold  of  my  panta- 
loons, lead  me  around  behind  the  house,  and 
introduce  me  to  her  puppies  born  in  my 
absence. 

I  saw  there  was  something  on  her  mind. 
She  seemed  ashamed  and  troubled  lest  some- 
body would  tell  me  before  she  had  a  chance 
to  explain.  So  she  led  me  in  haste  to  her 
modest  cottage  behind  the  servants  quar- 
ters before  she  would  allow  me  to  enter  the 
house. 

"You  see  it  was  like  this,  sir,"  she  said 
with  confusion ;  "I  know  you  don't  like  drop- 
pers, and  it's  not  considered  good  form  in 
aristocratic  society  for  a  setter  to  mate  with 
a  pointer,  but  really  I  couldn't  resist  Bob. 
He  was  so  handsome  and  stylish  and  we  were 
thrown  together  so  much,  it  all  came  about 
quite  naturally.  We  hunted  together  and 
Bob  stood  so  beautifully  and  found  so  many 
birds  and  was  so  kind  to  me — I  confess — I 
lost  my  heart.     And  when  he  asked  me  to 


BOB    ON    A    CLOSE    POINT 


The  Fellowship  of  Dogs  33 

marry  him,  I  knew  I  was  doing  a  wicked 
thing  to  disobey  you,  but — we  eloped." 

"Why,  Becky,  I'm  astonished  at  you!" 

She  hung  her  head  and  stammered  inco- 
herently, but  looking  up  with  a  smile  said: 

"Yes,  sir,  but  you  haven't  seen  'em — 
come,  look  at  'em.  They're  every  one  of 
them  raving  beauties.  You  see,  I  was  so  in 
love  with  Bob,  they  all  took  after  him.  Not 
one  of  them  seems  to  have  a  drop  of  setter 
blood  in  him.  They  all  have  the  short  silky 
hair  of  their  father  and  the  most  beautiful 
spots!" 

It  was  true.  Every  one  of  them  was  a 
pointer  and  the  cutest  little  fellows  I  ever 
saw. 

When  Becky  saw  I  was  pleased  she  began 
to  sob. 

"  There,  there,  Becky,  it's  all  right  now;  we 
will  make  fine  hunters  out  of  them,  and  no- 
body will  ever  suspect  they  are  droppers." 

"You  see,  sir,  I've  been  so   lonely  since 


34  The  Life  Worth  Living 

Sailor's  death  I  had  to  marry  again,  and  I 
must  say  Bob  is  the  handsomest  dog  I  ever 
knew,  and  he  can't  help  that  he's  a  pointer." 

"Very  well,  I'll  provide  for  your  children, 
and  see  that  they  are  properly  educated.  If 
any  one  tries  to  insult  you  in  your  set,  let  me 
know  and  I'll  protect  you." 

"  It  was  not  that  I  had  forgotten  Sailor,  sir, 
but  he  was  dead  and  I  was  lonely." 

"Yes,  I  know;  it's  an  old,  old  story.  You 
have  good  precedents." 

Becky  knew  that  I  had  loved  her  former 
mate,  Sailor,  above  all  the  dogs  I  had  ever 
known.  They  were  both  born  in  North 
Carolina,  the  home  of  fine  field  dogs. 

Sailor  was  a  beautiful  white  and  black 
Llewellyn  setter,  whose  white  tail  flying 
above  the  grass  looked  like  a  sail  skimming 
the  sea,  and  from  this  he  got  his  name.  He 
could  find  more  birds  than  any  four  dogs  that 
ever  went  into  the  field  with  him,  and  do  it 
quicker.     He  was   a   fine  wTatchdog.     When 


THE    LOG-CABIN    STUDY   ON   THE    EDGE    OF   THE    LAWN 


The  Fellowship  of  Dogs  35 

I  was  away  from  home  he  slept  in  his  mis- 
tress' room  and  I  believe  he  would  have  torn 
an  intruder  to  pieces  at  a  single  word  from 
her. 

Sailor  had  strange  powers  of  observation 
for  a  dog,  and  many  special  likes  and  dislikes. 
He  could  spot  a  crank  or  a  fool  among  a  gang 
of  workmen  and  would  watch  his  opportu- 
nity to  snap  him.  We  had  at  one  time  thirty- 
five  workingmen  here  every  day.  Some  of 
them  stayed  months.  Among  them  was  a 
poor  white  man  who  was  a  quack  doctor,  a 
quack  preacher,  and  a  quack  workman. 
Sailor  spotted  him  by  some  subtle  power  of 
reasoning  the  first  day  he  landed  and  tried  to 
bite  him.  That  man  stayed  around  our  place 
tinkering  at  various  jobs  for  two  months,  and 
the  dog  managed  to  tear  his  pantaloons  three 
times  and  got  one  good  crack  at  his  leg, 
and  he  was  never  known  to  disturb  any  other 
workman. 

When  he  first  arrived  from  North  Caro- 


36  The  Life  Worth  Living 

lina,  he  was  two  years  old  and  not  very 
good  looking.  I  got  him  in  the  spring 
and  had  to  keep  him  all  summer  before  I 
could  try  him.  I  didn't  like  his  movements 
and  in  general  thought  him  a  failure.  He 
was  passionately  fond  of  a  horse — a  rather 
unusual  trait  for  a  bird-dog.  So  I  sent  him 
to  the  stable  and  never  allowed  him  to  see 
the  inside  of  the  house. 

When  the  first  of  November  came,  I  took 
him  out  in  the  field  for  a  trial  with  little  faith 
in  his  ability. 

The  way  he  swept  that  field  fairly  took  my 
breath ! 

The  other  dogs  simply  were  not  in  his  class. 
He  was  the  whole  show.  He  would  circle  a 
hedgerow  like  a  white  streak  of  light,  sud- 
denly dart  out  into  the  open,  his  beautiful 
head  flung  high  in  the  air,  and  have  the  birds 
before  the  other  dogs  had  started. 

I  hugged  him.  When  we  returned  home 
that  night  he  knew  the  change  in  his  status 


The  Fellowship  of  Dogs  37 

in  that  household.  He  walked  proudly  into 
the  library  and  lay  down  on  the  rug  at  my 
feet  without  waiting  for  an  invitation.  He 
knew  the  place  belonged  to  him. 

Sailor  and  Becky  had  only  been  married 
six  months,  and  their  first  brood  of  puppies 
were  three  months  old  when  he  developed  an 
ugly  growth  on  one  of  his  legs.  I  took  him  to 
a  hospital  in  New  York  near  Herald  Square 
and  a  distinguished  English  dog  surgeon  per- 
formed an  operation  and  removed  the  growth. 
He  did  well  with  the  wound  and  in  ten  days 
was  ready  to  go  home. 

How  he  wept  for  joy  when  I  came  to  take 
him,  told  me  of  his  suffering  under  the  knife, 
and  how  he  longed  for  the  sight  of  my  face 
and  the  sound  of  my  voice!  I  explained  to 
him  that  I  didn't  come  because  I  couldn't 
bear  to  see  him  surfer. 

"And,  Master,"  he  sobbed,  "the  awful 
loneliness  these  ten  days  I  was  getting  well, 
and  you  only  stayed  a  minute  or  two !     I  had 


38  The  Life  Worth  Living 

to  endure  the  vile  talk  of  these  ignorant  and 
degenerate  city  dogs.  All  they  know  is  the 
latest  brand  of  vile  dog  biscuits  that  I 
wouldn't  give  a  cur  to  eat,  or  about  some 
collar  they  wore  or  a  new  coat  for  a  party,  or 
the  last  fight  they  had  in  Central  Park  on 
Sunday.  It  made  me  sicker  than  ever. 
Not  one  of  them  ever  saw  a  rabbit  or  a  quail 
or  a  woodcock.  I  asked  one  of  them — a  real 
setter  too — if  the  dogs  up  here  were  good  on 
a  back  stand  or  did  they  crowd  much.  The 
fool  didn't  know  what  I  was  talking  about 
and  yelled  back  at  me :  "  Listen  at  the  hay- 
seed! He  don't  know  a  street  car  from  a 
milk  wagon !  Wow,  Wow ! "  And  the  whole 
mob  of  the  ill-mannered  brutes  yelled  at  me, 
until  I  crawled  back  in  a  corner,  lay  down 
and  cried  for  shame  that  I  was  a  dog.  I'm 
glad  we're  going  home.  I'm  sick  for  the  open 
fields  and  the  cool  water  of  the  springs  and 
the  branches,  and  I've  dreamed  day  and 
night  of  the  birds." 


SAILOR    AND   THE    BOYS    IN    PRIVATE   THEATRICALS" 
"THE   MYSTERY    OF    SLEEP" 


The  Fellowship  of  Dogs  39 

When  the  cabman  was  assisting  Sailor 
down  stairs  and  into  the  cab,  the  doctor 
gravely  whispered: 

"I'm  sorry  to  tell  you,  sir,  but  your  dog 
can't  live  long.  He  has  a  tumor  developing 
in  the  groin  which  will  kill  him  within  a  year 
or  two.  He  can  hunt  all  right  up  to  the  day 
it  strikes  a  vital  organ  and  then  he  will  go." 

He  seemed  so  happy,  with  his  head  out  the 
cab  window  sniffing  contemptuously  at  the 
poor  little  chained  and  collared  dogs  he  saw 
on  the  streets!  Now  and  then  he  would  lick 
my  hand  with  a  grateful  dog  kiss  for  what  I 
had  done  for  him  and  for  the  joy  of  home 
that  was  in  his  soul.  How  could  I  tell  him 
the  fatal  secret  that  Death  had  already  laid 
his  hand  on  his  silken  hair  and  claimed  him 
as  his  own? 

A  little  while  longer  we  would  smell  the 
fields  together  and  our  hearts  thrill  with  the 
joy  of  the  chase,  and  he  would  go.  I  won- 
dered where!    And  my  heart  was  heavy. 


40  The  Life  Worth  Living 

We  had  two  more  glorious  seasons  together, 
and  as  the  end  drew  nearer  he  seemed  brighter, 
swifter  and  more  human  in  his  intelligence. 

The  second  summer  after  the  doctor's  ver- 
dict, he  suddenly  dropped,  one  day,  under 
the  shadow  of  a  great  elm  on  the  lawn. 
Death  had  called  him,  and  he  crouched  and 
shivered  at  my  feet  afraid  of  his  new  Master. 
I  tenderly  smoothed  his  beautiful  hair.  He 
looked  up  into  my  face  at  last,  his  great  soft 
eyes  full  of  a  strange  terror.  Unable  to  bear 
it,  I  started  to  leave  him.  He  staggered  to 
his  feet  and  tried  to  follow  me,  took  three 
steps  forward,  stumbled  and  fell. 


CHAPTER  VI 

Some  Sins  of  Nature 

Where  else  on  earth  is  the  general  cussed- 
ness  of  things  so  vividly  displayed  as  on  a 
farm?  The  farm  is  the  great  School  of  Life, 
and  no  man's  early  education  is  fairly  begun 
until  he  has  taken  a  course  on  it. 

I  tried  to  keep  out  of  farming  when  I 
bought  my  country  home.  An  early  train- 
ing behind  the  plough  was  my  inheritance  as 
a  boy. 

I  knew  it  was  not  all  poetry. 

The  estate  was  in  the  hands  of  executors 
for  sale  as  a  whole.  In  vain  I  pleaded  for  the 
lawn  and  garden  and  fifty  acres  to  tinker 
with.  The  price  fixed  for  the  house  and  lawn 
and  fifty  acres  was  just  as  large  as  for  the 
whole  place  of  five  hundred  acres.     I  didn't 


42  The  Life  Worth  Living 

understand  the  sarcasm  of  this  till  long  after. 
The  temptation  could  not  be  resisted.  There 
was  a  lordly  suggestion  about  "broad  acres," 
and  there  was  a  challenge  in  the  soil  and  sky 
that  roused  my  righting  blood.  I  longed  to 
conquer,  subdue  and  make  it  fruitful. 

Besides,  I  had  a  sneaking  idea  that  I  knew 
more  about  farming  than  any  farmer  of  my 
acquaintance.  All  that  was  necessary  was  a 
large  opportunity  to  demonstrate  the  breadth 
of  my  genius.     I  got  it. 

First,  I  determined  to  get  rich  on  fancy 
truck  farming. 

The  people  of  Gloucester,  who  had  no  rail- 
roads, were  slow  and  ultra-conservative.  I 
determined  to  hustle  after  the  manner  of  the 
Yankee  and  the  Westerner,  and  show  them 
how  to  do  things. 

I  put  in  fifty  acres  of  Rockyford  canta- 
loupes and  ten  acres  in  cabbage.  I  had  no 
idea  how  many  cabbage  plants  could  be  set 
in  ten  acres  of  ground  before. 


Some  Sins  of  Nature  43 

I  knew  after  I  paid  for  the  labour. 
I  had  a  gang  of  men  at  work  a  week  on  it, 
after  patient  and  careful  preparation  of  the 
soil   with   the   most    expensive   commercial 
fertilizer.      In    the    winter    I   studied    the 
weather  with  nervous  fear  for  those  thousands 
of   precious   cabbage   plants.      They  pulled 
through  well,  with  the  loss  of  about  twenty 
per  cent.     In  the  early  spring  the  worms  and 
bugs  and  lice  in  succession  attacked  them  and 
we  lost  twenty  per  cent.  more.     But  by  rapid 
working  and  high  fertilizing  we  pushed  them 
ahead  of  these  pests.     Then  they  began  to  go 
crazy  and  run  up  to  seed  and  blossom  in- 
stead of  making  cabbage  heads.     Five  per 
cent,  more  were  lost  in  these  seed  stalks. 

At  last  the  day  came  for  marketing.  It 
was  a  day  of  excitement.  They  were  selling 
in  the  New  York  market  for  $2.25  a  crate,  by 
the  papers,  and  that  meant  a  neat  profit  on 
the  field.  I  began  to  pity  my  neighbours  who 
were  still  struggling  with  common  farming. 


44  The  Life  Worth  Living 

My  triumph  was  brief.  I  got  75  cents  a 
crate  for  my  first  shipment.  They  cost  a 
dollar  at  the  most  conservative  estimate. 
The  next  shipment  brought  25  cents  a  crate, 
and  the  next  one  was  held  for  the  freight 
charges .  and  dumped  by  the  transportation 
company.  I  sent  the  ploughs  into  the  field 
and  tenderly  turned  under  for  fertilizer  my 
crop  of  cabbage  over  which  I  had  toiled  and 
yearned  and  dreamed.  I  quietly  determined 
to  let  somebody  else  raise  cabbage. 

My  cantaloupes  grew  beautifully.  I'm 
especially  fond  of  a  fine  cantaloupe  and  I 
determined,  for  the  sheer  love  of  the  thing, 
to  grow  the  finest  melon  New  York  ever 
tasted.  I  did  it.  The  first  shipment,  how- 
ever, gave  me  a  chill.  Instead  of  $3  a  crate 
I  had  expected,  I  got  an  average  of  85 
cents  a  crate.  They  cost  me  $1.25.  The 
next  shipment  brought  50  cents,  and  the 
next  25  cents. 

I   had   nervous  prostration   and   went  to 


Some  Sins  of  Nature  45 

New  York  to  study  the  distribution  problem 
in  connection  with  production. 

I  found  my  commission  man  was  also  a 
retail  dealer,  and  that  he  sold  my  melons  to 
himself  and  then  sold  them  to  his  trade,  and 
that  this  was  the  rule,  not  the  exception.  I 
found  my  melons  in  the  refrigerator  of  a  great 
hotel,  and  the  steward  informed  me  they 
were  the  finest  ever  seen  on  the  New  York 
market.  He  didn't  know  why  I  was  inter- 
ested and  I  let  him  talk.  He  told  me  he  paid 
the  commission  merchant  to  whom  I  had 
shipped  them  $3.50  a  crate.  He  was  paying 
me  25  cents. 

I  had  a  pleasant  interview  with  this  com- 
mission-retailer who  was  kindly  assisting  me 
to  bankruptcy.  His  explanation  was  so 
beautiful,  so  plausible,  so  incontrovertible  I 
had  to  thank  him  and  ask  his  pardon  for  dis- 
turbing him  while  he  was  figuring  out  his 
profits.  He  said  the  melons  were  so  roughly 
handled  by  the  steamship  company  (our  Old 


46  The  Life  Worth  Living 

Dominion  Line  is  one  of  the  most  careful 
freighters  in  America)  and  arrived  in  such  bad 
order,  he  had  to  knock  open  four  or  five 
crates  to  make  one  fit  for  a  first-class  hotel.  I 
apologized  for  putting  him  to  so  much  trouble, 
sent  my  agent  direct  to  the  hotels  and  took 
orders  for  all  I  could  supply  at  $3  a  crate. 

Once  more  I  smiled  at  the  mental  reflec- 
tion of  my  eagle  eye  and  massive  brain  and 
fell  to  pitying  my  neighbours. 

The  new  arrangement  went  forward  well. 
I  had  shipped  a  thousand  dollars'  worth  of 
melons  and  was  figuring  out  the  gross  earn- 
ings and  the  net  profits  and  planning  great 
outlays  for  the  following  year. 

A  drought  struck  us,  killed  all  the  old  vines 
in  a  few  days  and  ripened  prematurely  every 
melon  in  the  three  fields  I  had  planted  for 
succession.  They  were  not  fit  to  eat.  I 
cancelled  the  hotel  orders,  bought  some  hogs 
and  fed  them  on  thirty  acres  of  cantaloupes, 
that  cost  me  $2,000  in  cold  cash. 


Some  Sins  of  Nature  47 

I  retired  from  the  trucking  business,  and 
decided  that  hay  was  good  enough  for  me. 

I  built  a  big  hay  barrack  and  put  in  a 
trolley  fork  and  seeded  the  farm  in  peas, 
clover  and  grasses. 

In  six  weeks  after  the  barn  was  built,  a 
storm  blew  it  down.     I  cheerfully  rebuilt  it. 

We  jammed  it  full  of  pea  hay  in  one  end 
and  timothy  and  clover  in  the  other.  Besides, 
we  had  every  other  barn  full  and  some 
stacked  in  the  field.  At  last,  I  saw  daylight. 
The  hay  under  cover  was  selling  at  the  barn 
door  for  enough  to  pay  all  expenses  and  give 
me  $1,000  in  a  dividend.  Again  I  shook 
hands  with  myself  and  wondered  why  the 
farmers  of  Gloucester  county  didn't  have  sense 
enough  to  raise  hay.  When  I  opened  the  big 
new  barn  to  sell  the  first  load  out  of  the  pile  of 
ton  on  ton  where  my  profits  lay,  I  found  it 
had  rotted  beneath  the  surface.  It  cost  me 
fifty  dollars  to  clear  that  barn  of  hay. 

Then    an    epidemic    of    a    strange    horse 


48  The  Life  Worth  Living 

disease  that  no  veterinary  surgeon  ever  saw 
or  heard  of  struck  us,  and  carried  off  $500 
worth  of  farm  horses  in  two  weeks. 

I  had  never  believed  the  wild  stories  about 
the  modern  negro  farm  labourer  in  the  South 
till  I  tried  it.  In  three  years  I've  hired  over 
one  hundred  negro  farm  hands  and  dis- 
charged all  save  three  of  them,  who  are  first- 
class  men.  I  tried  patiently  to  teach  one 
I  kept  six  months  to  do  a  few  simple  neces- 
sary things  with  modern  farm  machinery. 
At  the  end  of  six  months  he  broke  three 
mowers  in  one  day  on  a  beautiful  level  piece 
of  clover. 

I  discharged  him,  and  that  night  lost 
twenty  dollars'  worth  of  harness  out  of  my 
barn. 

Large  groups  of  my  African  neighbours 
keep  horses,  dogs  and  children  and  yet  are 
opposed  to  a  strenuous  life  of  systematic  and 
constant  labour. 

I'm    now    spending    cheerfully    $500    on 


'*#*!: 


THE    INEVITABLE 


Some  Sins  of  Nature  49 

fences .  I '  ve  determined  to  raise  cattle .  Will 
the  fever  strike  them,  I  wonder?  Who  knows? 

The  experience  of  these  three  years,  in 
which  my  total  farm  losses  have  reached 
about  $7,000,  has  given  me  a  feeling  of  ten- 
derness and  sympathy  for  the  farmer  I  never 
had  before.  Who  can  measure  the  sum  of 
his  anguish  through  the  years  as  he  watches 
the  fleeting  clouds  in  the  brazen  heat  of 
summer  and  sees  no  sign  of  rain,  knowing 
that  every  moment  of  that  heat  is  burning 
to  ashes  the  hopes  he  has  cherished  for  his 
loved   ones? 

With  me  farming  is  a  dissipation.  I  am 
willing  to  spend  my  hard-earned  money  in 
this  game  with  Fate.  It  is  gambling.  The 
cruelty  and  sheer  brutality  of  Nature  fasci- 
nate me — she  who  has  no  ear  to  hear,  no 
heart  to  pity,  no  arm  to  save  the  weak, 
knows  no  conventions  of  morals  or  qualms  of 
conscience,  breeds  and  kills  by  the  million 

while  her  eternal  life  rolls  on  forever. 
4 


50  The  Life  Worth  Living 

But  when  I  look  on  a  little  check  sent  in 
for  a  year's  struggle,  not  large  enough  to  pay 
for  the  labour  expended,  when  I  look  on  a 
dead  field  parching  in  the  August  sun,  gaze 
on  the  ruins  of  a  storm- wrecked  barn,  see 
men  dumping  ton  on  ton  of  spoiled  hay,  or 
gaze  on  the  carcass  of  a  horse  as  they  drag 
him  away  for  burial,  and  think  of  what  this 
means  to  a  man  whose  bread  depends  on 
it,  the  pity  and  the  pathos  of  it  all  over- 
whelms me.  Back  of  the  serene  beauty  of 
Nature  I  see  her  tragic  cruelty.  Man  must 
obey  her  laws  or  die.  Alas,  how  few  of  us 
know  her  laws! 

Yet  there  is  something  supremely  fasci- 
nating in  this  fight  with  sun  and  storm,  earth 
and  air,  their  mysterious  moods  and  myriads 
of  swarming  lives.  Man  has  not  been  bap- 
tized into  the  life  of  our  planet  until  he  has 
felt  the  challenge  and  tested  the  sinews  of 
his  soul  in  this  combat. 

There  is  something  still  more  stirring,  too, 


Some  Sins  of  Nature  51 

in  the  great  human  struggle  pending  between 
the  American  farmer,  the  most  intelligent, 
aggressive  and  powerful  Producer  in  the 
world,  and  the  forces  of  Distribution.  At 
present  the  distributer  gets  it  all  in  the  long 
run. 

It  requires  more  brain  and  moral  fibre, 
muscle  and  soul  patience,  to  successfully  run 
a  large  farm  to-day  than  to  conduct  any  other 
enterprise  of  modern  civilization. 

And  town-bred  dudes  have  been  known  to 
sneer  at  "hayseeds." 


CHAPTER  VII 
The  Shouts  of  Children 

I  believe  it  is  a  crime  to  rear  a  child  in 
New  York  city,  or  any  great  city.  The 
man  who  is  imprisoned  in  this  living  tomb 
by  business,  may  plead  a  fair  excuse,  yet  it 
is  none  the  less  a  crime. 

It  is  a  physical  and  spiritual  impossibility 
to  rear  a  normal  human  being  under  the 
conditions  which  surround  child-life  in  the 
modern  city.  His  earth  is  merely  a  huge 
cobblestone  with  asphalt  patches.  There  is 
no  sun  or  moon  or  star.  Day  and  night  are 
one.  The  seasons  disappear.  Artificiality 
is  the  rule,  and  Nature  becomes  a  synonyme 
for  sin. 

I  shall  never  forget  the  sight  of  five  hun- 
dred city  waifs  I  ran  into  one  hot  July  night 


The  Shouts  of  Children  53 

as  I  was  hurrying  through  the  car  shed  of 
the  Pennsylvania  Railroad  to  catch  the  train 
for  my  home. 

A  philanthropist  had  given  a  mission 
society  the  money  to  send  these  five  hun- 
dred poor  children,  who  never  saw  a  green 
field  or  sat  beside  beautiful  waters,  out-  into 
the  country  for  two  weeks.  Poor  little  old 
wizen-faced  men  and  women,  they  didn't 
know  how  to  laugh  or  play!  If  they  had 
been  going  to  a  funeral,  they  could  not  have 
been  more  serious.  The  word  country  had 
no  meaning  for  them. 

Who  can  measure  the  tragedy  of  these 
millions  of  tramping  child  feet  crowding  one 
another  into  the  grave  without  one  glimpse 
of  this  wonderful  world  through  which  they 
have  passed? 

I  do  not  know  of  a  single  man  of  any  force 
in  modern  civilization  whose  character  was 
developed  in  a  great  city.  President  Roose- 
velt is  the  only  man  I  can  recall  of  any 


54  The  Life  Worth  Living 

world  prominence  to-day  who  was  born  in  a 
great  city,  and  he  became  a  man  because  he 
got  out  of  it,  and  put  himself  in  touch  with 
Nature. 

My  children  were  prisoners  in  New  York. 
In  Old  Virginia  they  find  life  and  freedom. 
There  the  doctor  came  every  week,  here 
once  a  year  is  enough.  We  have  no  signs  to 
"keep  off  the  grass."  The  lawn  is  theirs, 
and  on  its  open  greensward  or  beneath  its 
spreading  elms  and  oaks  every  game  that 
can  tempt  a  child's  heart  they  can  play  from 
year's  end  to  year's  end. 

Here  they  learn  to  watch  for  the  first  signs 
of  life  in  spring. 

We  have  a  boy  whose  eye  discovers  the 
first  ripening  strawberry,  cherry,  raspberry, 
melon  and  vegetable.  Long  before  we  think 
of  looking,  his  keen  little  eyes  have  found 
them,  and  his  swift  bare  feet  come  bounding 
to  his  mother  as  he  holds  the  treasure  aloft 
in  triumph. 


WE    HAVE    A    BEAUTIFULLY    CURVED    SAND    BEACH    ON    THE    LAWN 


The  Shouts  of  Children  55 

The  whole  round  of  countiy  life  is  a  thrill- 
ing daily  drama  for  a  child.  When  tired  of 
play  he  explores  the  barn  in  search  of  hen's 
nests,  and  finds  them  in  the  most  unheard 
of  places,  sometimes  under  the  floor,  some- 
times in  the  hay  rack  far  up  near  the  ceiling. 
He  has  a  duck  house  of  his  own  at  the  barn, 
shuts  his  ducks  up  every  night  and  keeps 
them  there  till  eight  or  nine  o'clock  in  the 
morning  to  be  sure  of  their  eggs.  After  Mrs. 
Duck  has  laid,  he  hustles  them  off  to  the 
creek  to  feed  on  bugs  and  worms  and  fid- 
dlers and  fish-eggs. 

It  is  astonishing  how  many  bird's  nests 
that  boy  can  find  on  the  lawn  and  in  the 
thick  hedgerows  around  the  garden  and 
orchard.  At  first  he  would  rob  them  all. 
But  it  was  easy  to  teach  him  how  much 
more  fun  he  could  get  listening  to  the  songs 
of  mockingbirds,  watching  them  sit  and 
hatch,  feed  their  babies  and  teach  them  to 
fly,  than  by  breaking  up  their  nests.     Now 


56  The  Life  Worth  Living 

he  guards  these  nests  with  jealous  care. 
The  mockingbird,  the  wren,  and  song  spar- 
row, the  redbird  and  bluebird,  catbird  and 
thrush,  hear  his  soft  footfall  without  dis- 
tress. His  life  has  become  larger  and  his 
heart  bigger. 

He  watched  a  tiny  sparrow  build  her  nest 
in  the  grass  this  spring  close  beside  the  path- 
way to  the  Steamer's  Pier.  He  saw  the  first 
egg  and  the  last,  and  then  the  brooding 
mother,  and  then  the  little  birds,  with  grow- 
ing interest.  He  kept  the  dogs  and  the  pup- 
pies away  and  guarded  her  with  zealous  care. 
Just  as  the  bird  babies  were  feathering  and 
nearly  ready  to  fly  they  made  such  a  big 
houseful,  some  beast,  a  bird  of  prey,  a  rat  or 
a  crow  perhaps,  found  them.  As  we  went  to 
the  Pier  at  boat  time  they  were  all  right, 
and  the  mother  was  chirping  with  pride  in 
the  tree  above.  When  we  returned,  in  half 
an  hour,  the  nest  was  torn  from  its  perch  in 
the  grass  and  every  bird  gone.     The  mother 


ALL    HAVE    SADDLES    AND    RIDE    LIKE    VETERAN    CAVALRYMEN 


The  Shouts  of  Children  57 

was  crying  as  though  her  heart  were  broken. 
And  then  a  boy's  eyes  grew  dim.  Who  can 
weigh  the  value  of  such  incidents  in  the  shap- 
ing of  a  human  soul?  How  many  brass 
bands,  monkeys  and  hand  organs  would  it 
take  to  compensate  for  their  loss  ? 

When  the  children  are  tired  of  the  land, 
the  sea  calls. 

We  have  a  beautifully  curved  sand  beach 
on  the  lawn  that  invites  for  a  bath,  and  row- 
boat  and  sailboat  are  always  nodding  their 
friendly  challenge  tethered  to  their  pier. 
Somebody  is  always  fishing  in  sight,  and  the 
crabs  in  the  water's  edge  are  a  standing  chal- 
lenge. The  horses  and  mules,  colts  and 
puppies,  cows  and  calves  are  far  more  inter- 
esting to  our  children  in  their  daily  life  than 
the  wild  animals  of  a  circus.  Daily  life  is  a 
continuous  performance  in  which  the  child 
is  both  audience  and  ringmaster. 

My  riding  mare's  last  year's  colt  I  gave  to 
my  little  girl.     When  she  went  to  boarding 


58  The  Life  Worth  Living 

school,  in  every  letter  home  were  anxious 
inquiries  about  her  pet.  It  is  her  special 
joy  morning  and  evening  to  feed  and  curry 
and  brush  that  colt.  The  first  thing  she  did 
when  she  got  home  was  to  spring  from  the 
carriage  and  throw  her  arms  around  his  neck. 
She  is  now  profoundly  considering  the  prob- 
lem of  whether  she  will  make  a  riding  horse 
of  him,  or  break  him  to  shafts,  or  both.  All 
three  of  the  children  have  saddles  and  ride 
horseback  like  veteran  cavalrymen.  We 
think  nothing  of  sending  our  ten-year-old  on 
the  fleetest  saddle  mare  eight  or  ten  miles  on 
an  errand. 

They  love  the  handsome  thoroughbred 
cows,  too,  watch  their  calves  grow  from 
fluffy  wobble-legs  into  big  capering  year- 
lings, and  soon  learned  that  one  breed  of 
cows  do  not  give  sweet  milk  and  another 
breed  buttermilk. 

The  puppies,  perhaps,  interest  children 
more  than  any   other  animals.     I   suppose 


another  pleasure  of  my  boys  is  the  work  of  the 

trapper" 


The  Shouts  of  Children  59 

this  is  because  puppies  are  so  closely  kin  to 
children  in  their  thoughts  and  ways.  With 
them  life  is  all  play  and  fun  and  mischief. 

Two  pups  can  think  up  more  mischief  in  a 
day  than  two  children.  One  of  them  will  be 
quietly  sleeping  in  the  sun,  and  the  other 
one,  browsing  around  the  yard,  will  suddenly 
discover  something  of  immense  interest.  He 
runs  straight  to  his  sleeping  brother,  wakes 
him,  tells  him  about  it,  and  off  they  go.  A 
pup  needs  more  whipping  than  any  animal  I 
know,  if  given  the  open  lawn  and  field  in 
which  to  grow.  He  will  chew  everything  in 
reach,  including  chickens,  ducks,  turkeys, 
and  especially  sheep. 

I've  lost  two  sets  of  puppies  in  the  past 
year  on  account  of  sheep.  A  sheep  is  the 
most  tantalizing  thing  that  ever  looms  on 
the  horizon  of  a  dog's  life.  When  a  sheep 
sees  a  dog,  he  exhibits  first  a  most  intense 
curiosity,  lifting  his  head  high  in  the  air  and 
standing  stock  still.     When  the  dog  makes  a 


60  The  Life  Worth  Living 

movement  forward,  or  side  wise,  with  or 
without  any  idea  of  further  acquaintance 
with  the  sheep,  the  whole  flock  break  and 
run  as  though  the  devil  with  an  army  of 
fiends  were  after  them.  The  temptation  to 
chase  is  simply  beyond  the  power  of  any 
mere  pup  to  resist,  if  he  has  passed  the  age 
of  chewing  gum  shoes.  I  don't  blame  them. 
If  I  were  a  pup,  I'd  chase  sheep. 

When  a  pup  once  gets  a  taste  of  this  royal 
sport  there  is  but  one  remedy,  and  that  is  to 
cut  his  tail  off  just  behind  his  ears,  or  send 
him  to  the  city.  The  first  remedy  is  less 
cruel  than  the  second,  and  is  soon  over  with. 
A  puppy  fairly  grown,  with  the  sheep  habit 
well  fixed,  has  been  known  to  kill  fifty  sheep 
in  a  night.  He  never  eats  them,  but  just 
kills  for  the  fun  of  the  thing. 

I  paid  my  neighbour  for  four  lambs  one  of 
my  pups  killed,  and  on  the  fifth  occasion  the 
farmer  happened  on  the  ground  with  a  shot 
gun  and  persuaded  him  not  to  do  so  any 


\ 


I  BELIEVE  IN  THE  GUN  FOR  A  NORMAL  BOY 


The  Shouts  of  Children  61 

more.  I  mourned,  but  couldn't  complain. 
I  don't  like  sheep.  They  trouble  dogs.  I 
bought  a  small  flock  for  my  lawn  just  to 
train  the  pups.  Becky  and  Bob's  family 
have  grown  up  from  the  cradle  with  these 
sheep  and  never  molest  them. 

Another  pleasure  of  my  boys  is  the  work 
of  the  trapper.  The  moles  infest  the  lawn 
and  would  plough  up  whole  acres  of  grass  but 
for  the  boys  and  their  mole  traps.  They 
catch  one  nearly  every  day  when  they  get 
troublesome  and  soon  thin  them  out. 

Rats  kill  young  chickens  and  birds,  just  as 
a  puppy  kills  sheep,  for  the  fun  of  it.  A  rat 
killed  and  carried  out  of  a  brooder  seventy 
little  chickens  for  me  once  within  forty-five 
minutes.  A  rat  got  into  my  neighbour's 
brooder  and  killed  over  a  hundred  chickens 
in  one  night  and  left  them  in  great  piles.  A 
steel  trap  set  the  next  night  caught  him. 

But  of  all  the  traps  a  boy  ever  sets,  none 
gives  him  quite  the  keen  delight  of  an  old- 


62  The  Life  Worth  Living 

fashioned  rabbit-gum  set  skilfully  in  a  path 
along  the  hedgerow  or  in  some  deep  shel- 
tered glade. 

I  believe  in  the  gun  for  a  normal  boy.  I 
teach  my  boy  to  shoot  with  me  when  he  is 
so  small  he  has  to  kneel  and  a  number 
twelve  gun  kicks  him  flat  on  his  back.  It's 
funny  to  see  a  youngster  pick  himself  up  and 
declare  he  "didn't  feel  it  at  all!" 

Narrow  and  poor  is  the  child's  life  who 
never  roamed  the  fields  alone  with  his  dog 
and  a  gun  on  his  shoulder.  He  may  make  a 
man  without  it,  but  he  will  not  have  an  equal 
chance  with  the  boy  whose  heart  has  thrilled 
with  the  elemental  joy  that  links  him  to  the 
habits  and  instincts  of  four  thousand  years 
of  human  history.  The  first  man  was  a 
hunter,  a  trapper  and  a  fisherman.  When 
man  ceases  to  care  for  these  things,  or  de- 
cries them,  I  fear  that  he  is  either  sick,  a 
fool,  or  both. 

It  is  not  true  that  it  makes  him  cruel  or 


"the  first  man  was  a  hunter 


The  Shouts  of  Children  63 

selfish.  Upon  the  other  hand,  its  effects  are 
just  the  opposite.  He  draws  close  to  Nature, 
learns  her  laws,  and  feels  the  sweep  of  her 
elemental  life.  He  kills  only  what  is  fit  to 
eat  and  needed  for  food.  Every  element  of 
his  character  is  strengthened  by  the  care, 
skill,  patience,  judgment  and  zeal  with 
which  he  follows  game.  Such  boys  rarely 
commit  crime  or  display  mental  weakness. 
They  make  strong,  clean,  sane,  wholesome 
men. 


CHAPTER  VIII 
First  Lessons  in  Life 

If  I  had  exchanged  my  New  York  brown- 
stone  house  for  a  log  cabin  in  the  woods  on 
the  shores  of  the  Chesapeake  it  would  have 
been  a  good  trade,  if  the  boys  could  have 
had  boats. 

A  boy  who  learns  early  to  handle  a  boat 
has  achieved  more  in  education  than  he  who 
graduates  at  the  head  of  his  class  in  the  city 
high  school. 

A  boat  teaches  him  the  first  lessons  of 
life — Law  and  Obedience — in  vital  ways. 
You  can  talk  about  Law  to  a  boy  hours  and 
hours.  It  goes  in  at  one  ear  and  out  at  the 
other.  The  fact  is,  few  of  us  ever  learn  things 
in  the  abstract.  We  rarely  learn  anything 
until  Nature  raps  us  over  the  knuckles  and 
calls  our  attention  to  it. 


First  Lessons  in  Life  65 

A  boat  says  to  him : 

"Keep  in  harmony  with  the  Law  and  I 
am  your  swift  and  willing  servant.  But  if 
you  take  your  hand  off  that  sheet  in  a  gale, 
or  forget  to  ease  my  sail  to  that  cat's-paw  in 
the  wind,  I'll  dump  you  overboard." 

A  boat  never  talks  for  the  pleasure  of  hear- 
ing her  own  voice.  She  means  it,  and  it  is 
not  necessary  to  repeat  it.  One  ducking  is 
enough. 

The  love  which  a  boat  inspires  in  a  boy  is 
not  quite  like  any  other.  It  is  more  com- 
plex and  broadens  his  mental  and  spiritual 
horizon  in  proportion  to  its  complexity. 
He  may  love  a  horse,  or  a  mule,  or  a  dog 
simply  for  his  own  sake. 

A  boat  inspires  all  this  and  more.  He 
soon  learns  that  a  boat  has  a  soul  born  of 
the  union  of  Labour  with  Nature.  Though  a 
boat  is  made  of  wood  and  nails  and  rope  and 
cotton,  the  putting  together  of  those  pieces 
by  human  hand  and  brain  gives  it  the  im- 


66  The  Life  Worth  Living 

press  of  character  which  reveals  itself  the 
moment  she  is  afloat.  Boats  are  good  or 
bad,  tricky  or  true,  just  as  animals  and  folks. 

Sailing  on  the  river  one  day  with  my  ten- 
year-old  in  his  boat,  we  passed  another  boy 
in  a  narrow  cranky-looking  craft  with  a  big 
ugly  sail.  He  was  a  poor  youngster,  a  cook 
for  some  carpenters  near  by.  But  the 
salutes  between  them  were  given  with  all 
the  deference  of  two  ocean  captains  in  mid- 
Atlantic.  I  asked  my  skipper  what  was  the 
name  of  his  friend's  craft. 

"Hell,"  he  answered. 

"What?" 

"Yes,  sir,  'Heir— she's  so  tricky." 

A  boy  learns  to  love  or  hate  a  boat  for  its 
individuality  just  as  he  does  man  or  animal. 
This  love  for  the  boat  rouses  in  him  rever- 
ence for  Nature  in  her  larger  life. 

He  learns  that  winds  and  tides  have  souls. 

He  must  study  their  temper  and  moods. 
The  face  of  the  water  is  ever  changing  from 


'.40* 


HE    LEARNS    THAT   WINDS    AND    TIDES    HAVE    SOULS 


First  Lessons  in  Life  67 

laughter  to  tears,  from  joy  to  anger,  and  with 
each  breath  speaks  a  new  message.  He 
must  listen.     The  boat  compels  him. 

The  tides  speak  with  authority  and  eternal 
mystery.  With  never  a  break  they  ebb  and 
flow  twice  each  day.  He  must  know  their 
hours  and  plan  his  life  in  harmony  with 
them.  The  fish  and  crabs  obey  their  laws. 
He  must  know  whether  it  will  be  ebb  or 
flood  when  he  starts  home  from  a  day's  out- 
ing, or  he  will  miss  his  supper.  He  must 
figure  the  height  of  the  tide  to  cross  a  bar 
and  get  back  to  his  channel,  and  must  know 
the  hour  of  high  water  and  low  water,  the 
day  he  hauls  out  his  craft  to  scrape  her  bot- 
tom and  paint  her  with  copper.  The  tide  is 
his  ship's  railway  and  the  beach  his  drydock. 
He  must  study  the  humours  of  the  tide  and 
interpret  them.  When  the  tides  run  unusu- 
ally low  he  knows  the  wind  is  blowing  strong 
off  shore  outside  and  a  storm  is  brewing 
from  the  land.     When  the  tide  comes  rush- 


68  The  Life  Worth  Living 

ing  in  and  piles  up  its  flood  to  normal  reach 
two  hours  ahead  of  time  and  keeps  on  rising 
higher  and  higher,  he  knows  an  easterly 
storm  is  sweeping  in  from  sea  and  makes 
things  snug  for  its  coming.  Their  ever- 
lasting mystery  tantalize  him  with  a  thou- 
sand vague  questions  about  the  Power  back 
of  their  measureless  tons.  Early  he  learns 
the  lesson  of  Reverence  in  the  presence  of 
Mystery. 

A  boat  is  a  specific  for  conceit. 

When  a  boy  reaches  the  massive  age  of 
thirteen  and  begins  to  instruct  his  father  and 
mother  on  the  conduct  of  life  and  the  mean- 
ing of  things,  give  him  a  boat  and  turn  him 
loose  in  tidewater.  He  may  get  wet,  but  he 
will  be  saved  early  from  many  afflictions. 

I  told  my  boy  one  day  not  to  venture  too 
far  in  the  wind  and  tide  of  the  hour  from  the 
yacht  in  his  little  sailboat.  He  waved  his 
arm  to  me  in  lordly  gesture  and  informed  me 
he  could  sail  her  anywhere  in  sight  and  get 


First  Lessons  in  Life  69 

back  all  right.     I  said  nothing  and  let  him 
go.     An  hour  later,  I  came  out  of  the  cabin 
and  went  ashore  in  the  naphtha  tender  for 
supplies.     The  wind  was  blowing  a  spanking 
breeze  and  the  tide  was  running  with  the 
wind  like  a  mill-race.     I  saw  my  omnipotent 
young  navigator  oft  to  the  leeward  a  mile, 
anchored,  and  a  distress  signal  flying.     I  ran 
the  launch  within  a  quarter  of  a  mile  of  him, 
but  paid  no  attention  to  his  frantic  gestures 
for  help.     I  passed  on  to  the  shore  and  an 
hour  later  returned.     Again   I   passed  him 
waving  his  arms  and  bellowing  for  a  tow. 
When  I  got  back  to  the  yacht,  I  took  the 
megaphone  and  asked  him  why  he  didn't 
come  in  to  dinner.     The  wind  was  against 
him  and  no  words  from  him,  of  course,  could 
be  heard,  but  the  rapidity  of  his  pantomime 
explanation  of  the  impossibility  of  lifting  his 
anchor  in  the  terrible  tide  or  making  head- 
way against  it,  would  have  been  luminous  to 
a  wooden  Indian.     I  allowed  him  to  think 


70  The  Life  Worth  Living 

another  hour  and  then  sent  the  launch  to 
tow  him  in.  He  was  quiet  and  humble  for 
twenty-four  hours. 

Last  summer  that  same  boy  brought  his 
mother  home  through  a  wild,  stormy  night, 
over  miles  of  coaming  seas  in  a  naphtha 
launch.  He  sat  quietly  in  the  stern,  ran  the 
engine,  and  steered  the  boat  without  a  com- 
pass over  twelve  miles  of  black,  crooked, 
foaming  channel  without  once  running 
ashore.  He  was  only  fourteen  and  his 
mother  is  a  good  sailor,  but  more  than  once 
the  winds  heard  him  say  with  quiet  author- 
ity: 

"Come,  come,  Mamma,  don't  be  silly; 
there's  not  the  slightest  danger." 

Next  morning  his  mother  looked  at  him 
long  and  tenderly  with  softened  eyes.  She 
had  not  met  him  before. 

There  is  nothing  like  a  boat  to  develop  a 
boy's  executive  ability,  and  his  self-reliance 
within    the    limits    of   reason.     Watch    him 


First  Lessons  in  Life  71 

skilfully  beat  his  craft  to  the  windward,  and 
you  know  he  is  learning  one  of  the  first 
secrets  in  the  deep-seas  of  life.  Then  see 
him  round  the  bend  in  the  channel,  ease  off 
her  sheet,  and  lean  back  with  a  smile  as  he 
flies  before  the  wind  taking  his  girl  home, 
and  you  know  he  has  felt  the  thrill  of  the 
harmony  of  Nature  and  her  laws.  He  has 
come  into  a  heritage  no  calamity  can  imperil 
and  no  panic  ever  destroy. 


CHAPTER  IX 
Along  Shining  Shores 

I  hold  that  Old  Tidewater  Virginia  is 
the  most  fascinating  spot  on  our  planet.  I 
can  prove  it  by  the  shorebirds,  anyhow. 

When  the  migrating  snipe  have  raised 
their  young  in  the  far  South,  they  come 
north  to  spend  the  summer.  Far  up  in  the 
sky,  flying  V-shaped,  as  the  wild  goose,  the 
curlew  leads  the  way  in  April.  With  his  keen 
eye  surveying  from  the  heavens  the  glories 
of  the  world,  he  sweeps  over  the  wild  beauty 
of  the  tropics,  calling  now  and  then  his  silver 
trumpet-note  of  command  to  his  flock. 

But  when  he  looks  down  from  the  clouds 
and  sees  the  thousand  rivers,  creeks,  chan- 
nels and  solemn  marshes  of  Old  Tidewater 
Virginia,  his  voice  rings  with  joy,  his  wings 


Along  Shining  Shores  73 

droop  with  ecstasy,  and  the  whole  flock  break 
their  long  silence  with  such  a  shout  as  the 
Greeks  of  old  raised  when,  homeward  bound, 
they  first  beheld  the  sea. 

Gracefully  they  circle  downward,  chat- 
tering, calling,  screaming  their  delight. 
They  stop  and  spend  six  weeks.  They  know 
a  good  thing  when  they  see  it,  and  they  see 
the  world  from  pole  to  pole. 

The  curlew  is  to  the  shore  what  the  ruffed 
grouse  is  to  the  woods,  has  about  the  same 
weight  of  body,  and  carries  the  same  dark 
brown-and-black-spotted  plumage,  until  sun- 
burnt on  his  return  in  August.  His  bill  is 
about  four  inches  long,  unless  he  is  a  sickle- 
bill,  when  it  measures  from  rive  to  nine 
inches.  The  jack-curlew  is  now  the  only 
variety  seen  in  Virginia,  though  an  occa- 
sional marlin  or  sickle-bill  make  the  excep- 
tion to  the  rule. 

The  jack-curlew  is  the  wildest,  shrewdest 
and  most  tantalizing  bird  with  a  snipe's  bill 


74  The  Life  Worth  Living 

that  ever  worried  and  fascinated  a  hunter. 
His  eye  is  as  keen  as  a  wild  duck's,  and  his 
ways  past  finding  out.  I  have  hunted  them 
for  ten  years  in  Virginia,  and  many  an  eve- 
ning have  I  gone  home  with  but  two  or  three 
birds  for  supper,  while  the  sky  above  me 
rang  with  their  shouts  of  derision. 

I  have  watched  them  for  days  and  weeks 
going  in  thousands  to  a  certain  spot  on  a 
marsh  at  a  certain  tide.  I  mark  the  spot 
and  wait  ten  days  for  the  tides  to  get  back 
to  the  appointed  hour.  Then,  all  in  readi- 
ness, I  sneak  away  an  hour  ahead  of  my 
rival,  whom  I  half  suspect  of  knowing  my 
secret. 

Everything  depends  on  the  tides.  By  the 
calendar,  the  tide  should  make  high  water 
at  sundown.  If  it  does,  and  doesn't  make 
too  high  or  too  low,  and  the  birds  don't  find 
out  I'm  on  the  marsh  by  hearing  the  gun,  or 
from  the  report  of  a  scout — why,  then,  I'll 
get    some    of    them.      The  hunting   ground 


Along  Shining  Shores  75 

is  nine  miles  wide  and  eighty  miles  long, 
and  a  curlew  thinks  nothing  of  a  ten-mile 
flight. 

Two  hours  before  sundown,  I  reach  the 
ground.  I've  marked  the  spot  on  a  marsh  a 
mile  wide  and  seven  miles  long,  surrounded 
by  a  stretch  of  mud-bars  and  channels  at 
low  tide,  which  melt  into  a  beautiful  silvery 
bay  at  high  tide. 

I  go  in  my  naphtha  launch,  following  the 
winding  channels,  from  twelve  to  fifteen 
miles,  to  get  two  miles  as  the  crow  flies. 
But  I  must  get  to  the  marsh,  put  out  my  de- 
coys on  the  exact  spot  on  that  seven-mile 
stretch  to  which  the  birds  are  coming,  and 
hide  before  the  first  bird  appears,  and  this 
must  be  done  before  the  tide  rises.  The 
curlew  are  now  scattered  over  the  vast 
reaches  of  this  eighty-mile  bay,  eating  bugs, 
worms  and  sand-fiddlers  on  the  mud-bars 
and  on  the  creek  banks. 

I  leave  the  launch  at  the  head  of  the  chan- 


76  The  Life  Worth  Living 

nel  and  drag  the  hunting  dink  with  guns  and 
decoys  over  the  mud-bar  to  the  marsh. 

I  take  an  hour  to  locate  the  right  spot. 
I'm  dead  sure  of  the  place  they  went  the  last 
run  of  tides,  but,  if  the  conditions  of  weather 
differ,  they  may  change  their  notion  with 
the  change  of  wind  and  stop  a  mile  below  or 
go  a  mile  farther  on,  and  to  miss  their  track 
five  hundred  yards  is  to  miss  them  five  hun- 
dred miles.  They  will  not  listen  to  a  call  in 
their  great  flock  flights  on  this  run  of  tides. 

At  length  I  select  the  place  in  which  to  cast 
the  fate  of  the  day.  I  set  the  decoys  in  the 
short  grass  of  a  bald  high  place  on  the  marsh, 
exactly  where  I  believe  they  will  assemble  in 
grand  conclave  to  sit  out  the  high  water.  A 
hole  is  dug  with  a  spade  just  deep  enough  to 
lie  flat  on  one's  back  and  hide  below  the  sur- 
face of  the  ground,  and  tall  green  grass  is  cut 
and  stuck  carefully  around  the  hole  until  it 
looks  like  a  hundred  other  clumps  of  grass. 

The  calico  birds  begin  to  come  in  long  be- 


Along  Shining  Shores  77 

fore  a  curlew  is  seen  or  heard.  I  take  a 
crack  at  them  to  get  my  hand  in  for  Mr.  Jack 
Curlew.  The  calico  plover  is  a  fine  practice 
shot,  for  he  is  swift  as  lightning  unless  he 
sees  fit  to  decoy  perfectly. 

At  last  the  mud-flats  are  all  covered  and 
the  hour  has  come  for  the  flight  to  begin.  I 
am  on  the  lookout  for  a  scout.  The  curlew 
send  out  a  scout  to  survey  the  ground  to 
which  the  great  flocks  are  coming.  If  things 
look  suspicious,  he  goes  back  and  reports, 
and  they  change  their  flight  ten  or  twenty 
miles  in  another  direction. 

No  scout  appears.  I  wait  an  hour  and 
begin  to  grow  uneasy.  The  tide  is  slow,  a 
westerly  wind  has  spoiled  the  flow,  and  not  a 
curlew  comes  within  five  miles  of  me. 

I  try  the  next  afternoon,  and  the  wind 
jumps  around  to  the  east,  the  tide  covers  all 
creation  and  runs  me  out  of  my  hole  before  I 
get  a  shot,  even  at  a  calico. 

Again,  not  a  curlew  came  to  the  marsh. 


78  The  Life  Worth  Living 

They  all  went  to  the  sand-dunes  on  Myrtle 
Island,  fifteen  miles  below.  I  watched  them 
for  an  hour.  The  heavens  were  streaked 
with  them  as  far  as  the  eye  could  reach — 
north,  south,  east  and  west.  I  ground  my 
teeth  and  vowed  vengeance.  I  have  but  one 
more  day  of  this  run  of  tides.  If  they  don't 
come  to  the  marsh  the  next  night,  they  will 
not  come  till  the  tide  gets  around  again  in 
two  weeks. 

Again  I've  baled  out  my  hole  and  rebuilt 
my  grass  blind,  and,  snugly  resting  on  the 
rubber  blanket,  I  gaze  up  at  the  southern 
sky,  or  away  over  the  endless  marsh  and 
bay,  and  wait.  My  guide  has  gone  a  mile 
with  the  launch  and  hidden  in  the  tall  grass 
of  the  creek. 

How  still  the  world! 

To  the  east,  I  see  the  dim  white  line  of  the 
ocean  beaches,  but  the  wind  is  from  the 
south  and  I  cannot  hear  the  surf.  North, 
south  and  west  of  me  sweeps  the  dark  green 


> 


AWAY    OVER    THE    ENDLESS    MARSH 


Along  Shining  Shores  79 

marsh,  until  it  kisses  the  sky-line  and  fades 
into  eternity.  I  begin  to  dream  of  great 
things.  Nothing  small  disturbs  my  vision — 
not  a  house  or  man  or  woman  is  in  sight. 

I  begin  to  feel  pity  for  the  feathered  life 
I've  come  to  take,  when  my  eye  rests  on  a 
mother  fiddler  in  the  mud  beside  me,  peeping 
out  of  her  hole  to  make  sure  no  curlew  is  near 
before  venturing  out  for  food  for  her  chil- 
dren. I  clutch  my  gun  and  determine  to 
take  sides  with  the  fiddlers. 

"A  curlew's  a  mean  bird,  anyhow,"  I  mut- 
tered. " Confound  'em!  let  'em  come  here 
and  I'll  burn  'em  up!  Besides,  I've  prom- 
ised my  wife  enough  birds  for  the  table  this 
week." 

Suddenly  the  shrill  call  of  a  curlew  scout 
rang  over  the  marsh,  and  old  Mrs.  Fiddler 
cut  a  somersault  to  get  into  her  cyclone 
cellar. 

I  slipped  the  safety-lock  of  my  gun  and 
tried  to  get  under  my  hole  in  the  ground. 


80  The  Life  Worth  Living 

I  must  either  kill  that  scout  or  let  him  go 
back  without  seeing  me.  I  tremble  with  ex- 
citement, afraid  to  answer  his  call  lest  I  re- 
veal my  position.  I  know  he  has  seen  my 
decoys  and  determine  to  keep  silent  and  still 
as  death. 

He  came  high,  circled  around  me  twice, 
and  then  came  straight  up  behind,  about 
a  hundred  yards  in  the  air.  Just  over  the 
decoys  he  poised,  cocked  his  long-billed  head 
to  one  side  and  peered  down  at  me. 

I  knew  he  was  coming  no  closer  and  it  was 
a  long  chance  shot,  but  I  determined  to 
make  it  before  he  could  jump.  Lying  flat 
on  my  back,  I  snatched  up  my  number  ten 
and  let  him  have  a  snap-shot. 

He  quivered  a  moment,  and  down  he 
came,  softly,  without  a  struggle,  and  fell 
with  his  wings  spread  out  three  feet  on  the 
grass,  so  close  to  where  I  lay  that  I  could 
reach  him  without  rising. 

I  picked  him  up  and  found  a  tiny  scarlet 


Along  Shining  Shores  81 

spot  on  his  big  fat  brown  breast.     A  single 
shot  had  taken  effect. 

He  fell  just  at  Mrs.  Fiddler's  door,  and  left 
a  drop  of  blood  in  her  front  yard.     When  I 
lifted  him,  the  fiddler  emerged,  with   three 
trembling  little  fiddlers  clinging  to  her  skirts, 
smiled  and  thanked  me.     And  then,  seeing  a 
baby  snail  toddling  slowly  along  the  road  in 
front  of  her  house,  she  ran  out,  grabbed  him 
by  the  throat,  broke  his  neck,  tore  him  into 
bits  with  her  big  cruel  claw,  and  handed  the 
pieces  to  her  hungry  children. 

"It's  the  way  of  life,"  I  thought,  grimly. 
" Life  feeds  on  life;  the  man  on  fish  and  ani- 
mal; the  bird  on  the  fiddler;  the  fiddler  on 
the  snail;  the  snail  on  the  worm;  the  worm 
on  the  cabbage,  and  the  cabbage  on  the  vege- 
tarian!" 

And,  when  we  get  down  to  the  last  cell- 
life,  no  eye  can  tell  the  difference  between 
the' germ  that  will  grow  into  a  vegetarian  and 
the  one  that  will  grow  into  a  cabbage. 


82  The  Life  Worth  Living 

And  yet  the  vegetarians  put  on  holy  airs, 
and  say  mean  things  about  hunters  and 
meat-eaters.  I've  often  wondered  what  the 
cabbages,  beets,  turnips,  peas  and  beans 
whisper  to  one  another  about  these  people 
in  the  still  moonlit  nights  of  the  spring, 
when  they  are  struggling  to  reproduce  their 
kind. 

I  reloaded  my  gun  and  lay  for  another 
curlew.  In  about  half  an  hour  they  began 
to  come.  I  found  I  had  missed  the  spot  they 
had  selected  for  their  meeting  by  about  three 
hundred  yards.  They  were  going  just  be- 
yond my  blind,  three  hundred  yards  farther 
up  the  marsh  across  a  creek.  But  they  were 
leading  so  close  to  my  decoys  that  by  vigor- 
ous whistling  I  enticed  in  a  dozen  large  flocks 
and  scores  of  small  groups.  When  the  sun 
sank  I  had  bagged  seventeen.  I  went  home 
with  a  song  of  victory.  I  felt  I  could  look 
my  wife  and  children  in  the  face  once  more. 
Only  once  in  ten  years  did  I  break  this  rec- 


Along  Shining  Shores  83 

ord.  Then  I  had  the  remarkable  luck  of 
having  the  wind  and  tide  just  right  and  I  got 
to  the  right  place.  Then  I  carried  home 
twenty-six.  Fully  fifty  thousand  curlew 
came  on  the  marsh  that  afternoon. 

We  get  a  few  curlew  when  shooting  gray- 
back,  willet  and  plover  on  the  marshes  from 
blinds.  But  this  can  be  done  only  in  the 
early  part  of  the  season.  One  shot  from  a 
blind  is  all  that  is  necessary  to  educate  every 
curlew  who  sees  the  performance.  No 
amount  of  whistle-calling  will  get  him  to 
come  in  range  of  a  blind  again. 

At  ebb-tide  we  shoot  the  grayback,  black- 
breast,  yellow-legs  and  curlew  on  the  mud- 
bars,  where  they  come  to  feed  on  fiddlers  and 
bugs  as  the  tide  ebbs  off.  I  have  killed  a 
dozen  curlew  sometimes  from  an  ebb-tide 
blind. 

One  never-to-be-forgotten  day  the   gray- 
back  came  like  chickens,  and  I  made  a  bag 
of   eighty-two  on  the  first  of   the  summer 


84  The  Life  Worth  Living 

season.  The  grayback  snipe  decoys  beauti- 
fully and  is  the  toothsome  quail  of  the  shore 
and  marsh. 

But  by  far  the  most  interesting  sport  of 
the  shore  is  when  the  red-breasted  snipe 
come  suddenly  trooping  in  from  the  mists  of 
the  southern  seas  about  the  middle  of  May. 
They  feed  almost  exclusively  on  the  mussels 
of  the  ocean  beaches  at  ebb-tide.  They 
usually  appear  about  May  15,  though  their 
advent  varies  by  a  week  or  so,  according  to 
conditions  of  the  spring  weather. 

I  have  walked  along  the  surf  in  the  spring 
on  one  day  without  seeing  a  single  red-breast, 
and  have  gone  back  the  next  morning  and 
found  flocks  of  ten  thousand  chattering  and 
feeding.  They  came  in  the  night  out  of  dark- 
ness and  mystery,  and  they  will  go  in  two 
weeks,  as  they  came,  into  silence  and  mys- 
tery. 

Where  they  go  the  Virginia  hunter  does 
not  know.     Unlike  the  curlew  and  grayback, 


Along  Shining  Shores  85 

they  do  not  stop  on  their  return  flight  from 
the  North  Pole  in  August.  The  curlew  and 
grayback  come  in  April  and  leave  the  last  of 
May.  They  spend  five  weeks  in  the  far 
North  and  return  to  Virginia  about  July  15, 
and  remain  till  the  latter  part  of  August,  or 
middle  of  September. 

Not  so  the  red-breast.  He  comes  in  a 
night  in  May,  gets  fat  in  two  weeks  and 
leaves  suddenly.  He  is  not  seen  again  until 
next  spring. 

May  1 7  we  reached  the  Life  Saving  Station 
of  Smith's  Island,  by  the  invitation  of  its 
genial  captain,  George  Hitchens.  It  was 
blowing  a  furious  gale  and  raining  in  blind- 
ing sheets,  with  the  wind  hanging  steadily 
on  to  the  northeast. 

The  birds  had  not  come,  the  crew  told  us, 
but  Captain  George  said  they  would  come  in 
on  the  wings  of  the  storm  that  night.  At 
daylight  we  caught  the  old  plug  of  a  horse 
from  the  stable  and  hitched  him  to  the  cart. 


86  The  Life  Worth  Living 

The  Smith's  Island  Light,  just  over  our 
heads,  the  greatest  light  of  the  Atlantic 
coast,  was  still  flashing  its  gleaming  message, 
"45,"  over  the  storm-clouded  sea. 

Within  an  hour  we  had  reached  the  bend 
of  the  beach,  five  miles  above  the  station. 
The  tide  had  just  begun  to  ebb  as  the  sun 
burst  from  the  ocean  through  the  cloud- 
banks  of  the  passing  storm. 

The  Captain  was  right.  The  birds  had 
come  on  its  black  wings.  The  beach  was 
literally  covered  with  them.  We  were  in 
rare  luck.  We  were  the  first  on  the  beach, 
the  first  day  of  their  season,  and  the  wind 
was  blowing  a  steady  gale  from  sea,  just  the 
way  we  wished  it. 

Hastily  gathering  some  dead  bushes  and 
grass  from  the  sand-dunes,  we  build  a  scraggy 
blind,  place  our  decoys  on  the  edge  of  the 
receding  surf,  and  are  ready  for  them. 

How  beautifully  they  come! 

Sometimes  they  pitch  among  the  decoys. 


PLACE    OUR    DECOYS    ON    THE    EDGE    OF    THE    RECEDING    SURF 


Along  Shining  Shores  87 

First  they  come  in  little  bunches  of  two 
and  three,  when  we  take  one  with  each  bar- 
rel ;  then  the  big  flocks  begin  to  streak  along 
the  magnificent  surf  and  decoy  like  chickens. 

They  require  no  calling.  The  moment 
they  see  our  decoys  they  set  their  wings  in  all 
sorts  of  fancy  shapes  and  sweep  into  the 
happy  hunting-ground  to  share  the  mussels 
with  our  fat  wooden  birds,  whose  round 
shapes  no  doubt  excite  their  hunger  and 
envy. 

Some  set  their  wings  in  a  beautiful  bow- 
shaped  curve,  some  drop  them  gracefully 
downward,  some  swing  them  gracefully  up- 
ward and  drop  their  legs  as  they  descend. 

Sometimes  the  sky  is  black  with  them, 
their  wings  set  at  every  conceivable  angle. 
Then  it  was  impossible  to  choose  a  good  shot 
in  the  confusion  of  a  hundred  challenging 
groups.  We  generally  take  the  poorest 
chance  on  such  occasions,  and  perhaps  get 
one  bird  out  of  five  hundred. 


88  The  Life  Worth  Living 

The  ideal  flock  has  from  ten  to  fifteen 
birds.  We  wait  for  the  critical  moment 
when  they  double  in  their  flight  after  they 
swing  past  the  decoys.  A  shot  just  at  this 
second  will  often  kill  a  dozen. 

At  the  end  of  three  hours  the  tide  has 
ebbed  off,  and  the  sport  is  over  for  the  day. 

I  lie  down  on  the  sands,  and  wait  for  the 
flood  tide  to  catch  a  drum,  loath  to  leave  the 
glorious  spot.  North  and  south  stretches 
the  long  white  strip  of  sand  as  far  as  the  eye 
can  reach.  In  front  rolls  and  curls  and 
thunders  the  surf.  Behind  me  lies  in  shim- 
mering beauty  the  mirror  of  the  Broad- 
water bay,  nine  miles  wide  and  eighty  miles 
long.  There  is  not  a  human  habitation  in 
sight.  Above  me  the  infinite  space,  flecked 
now  with  white,  swift-flying  clouds — I  dream 
of  a  world  without  railroads,  or  mail — the 
happy  hunting-ground  the  red  man  saw  in 
visions  of  the  olden  time. 


NL 


y 

CHAPTER  X 
The  Breath  of  the  Southern  Seas 

The  only  way  to  really  get  out  of  doors  is 
to  push  off  fifteen  miles  from  shore  into  salt 
water.  Our  planet  is  a  globe  of  water 
through  which  five  or  six  big  lumps  of  dirt 
and  rock  project.  We  call  these  lumps  of 
exposed  earth,  continents,  and  imagine  they 
are  the  world,  when  as  a  matter  of  fact  they 
cut  a  comparatively  small  figure  in  the  total 
history  of  our  sphere. 

The  man  who  does  not  know  salt  water  is 
lopsided  and  undeveloped. 

I  have  known  people  who  spent  all  their 
days  on  one  spot  of  ground  on  one  of  these 
land  lumps  and  thought  they  could  teach 
the  children  of  men  the  deepest  truths  of 
universal  life. 


90  The  Life  Worth  Living 

Has  a  landlubber  lived? 

The  sea  is  our  most  expressive  symbol  of 
the  eternal,  and  the  truest  test  of  reality. 
Fifty  cents  may  pass  for  a  dollar  in  the  in- 
terior, but  when  it  strikes  salt  water,  it  is 
worth  just  fifty  cents. 

It  is  so  with  men. 

I  shall  never  forget  the  overwhelming 
sense  of  my  own  littleness  the  first  view  of 
the  ocean  brought  me.  I  had  graduated 
from  college,  and  owned  a  piece  of  pig-skin 
on  which  was  recorded  the  fact  that  I  was  a 
Master  of  Arts.  One  day  I  climbed  a  sand 
mountain  on  the  Cape  Hatteras  reef  and 
looked  out  over  five  miles  of  roaring  white 
breakers  beneath  whose  angry  tread  I  could 
feel  the  earth  tremble.  As  far  as  the  eye 
could  reach  they  came  bounding,  hissing  and 
leaping  after  one  another.  At  first  I  was 
stunned,  then  humbled,  and  at  last  moved 
to  love  and  worship.  I  took  off  my  hat  and 
felt  the  breath  of  the  Infinite  sweep  my  soul. 


The  Breath  of  the  Southern  Seas       91 

A  boat  is  the  only  instrument  by  which 
man  can  move  over  any  considerable  part 
of  the  earth's  surface. 

When  I  bought  my  first  boat,  and  became 
amphibious,  I  was  an  efficient  inhabitant 
of  the  world.  The  summer  before  I  had 
chartered  a  schooner-rigged  sharpie,  sailed 
bravely  out  of  a  shallow  inlet  from  the 
Pamlico  Sound,  skimmed  up  the  coast  fif- 
teen miles  to  the  Oregon  Inlet,  and  tried  to 
come  in.  Caught  by  a  squall  in  the  act 
of  threading  our  way  through  the  shoals 
of  this  dangerous  and  crooked  channel,  we 
were  held  there  for  twenty-three  hours  be- 
tween two  mountains  of  breakers  with  only 
a  quarter  inch  rusty  chain  anchoring  us  to 
life. 

I  said  then  that  if  I  ever  owned  a  boat  it 
should  have  a  wheel  at  one  end  of  it  and  a 
machine  to  drive  it.  So  I  bought  a  naphtha 
launch  in  New  York. 

We  named  her  the  Chattahoochee  for  the 


92  The  Life  Worth  Living 

memory  of  the  river  on  whose  beautiful 
banks  I  made  love  to  my  sweetheart.  She 
was  a  swift  and  powerful  little  craft — I  mean 
the  launch,  of  course.  For  two  years  we 
ran  her,  and,  within  her  sphere,  she  was  ever 
faithful.  After  nine  years'  experience,  I  am 
thoroughly  convinced  that  the  only  safe  and 
reliable  power  for  a  small  craft  (up  to  twelve 
horse-power)  is  this  naphtha  engine  which 
works  on  the  principle  of  steam.  It  cost  me 
several  thousand  dollars  to  learn  this,  but  I 
know  it  now,  and  I  do  not  need  any  further 
information  on  the  subject. 

We  sold  the  Chattahoochee  after  two  years' 
service  for  $850.  She  cost  $900  originally. 
Then  I  built  a  more  powerful  sea  boat  on  the 
model  of  the  U.  S.  Life  Saving  Surf  Boat, 
decked  her  over,  gave  her  a  nice  little  cabin 
with  two  berths,  rigged  her  with  a  small  cat- 
sail  and  put  a  2  H.-P.  naphtha  engine  in  her. 
She  proved  the  best  boat  for  her  inches  I  ever 
saw.     I  could  go  out  twenty  miles  at  sea,  and 


The  Breath  of  the  Southern  Seas       93 

fish  all  day  without  a  fear,  and  if  a  storm 
struck  us,  she  came  scurrying  home  over 
miles  of  coaming  seas  like  a  gull.  She  cost 
me  $700,  and  I  sold  her  for  more  than  she 
cost,  to  build  a  larger  and  more  powerful 
auxiliary  craft  on  the  same  model.  Then 
I  made  the  important  discovery  that  a  boat 
has  a  soul,  and  that  a  fool  could  not  build 
one.  This  boat  cost  me  $1,850,  and  five 
minutes  after  she  was  launched  I  wished  to 
sell  her.  I  had  placed  in  her  a  10  H. -P.  gaso- 
lene engine  of  the  explosive  type. 

I  worked  on  that  engine  two  hours  every 
morning  before  starting,  and  never  went  out 
of  harbour  knowing  when  I  would  get  back. 
She  had  the  devil  in  her  from  the  start. 
She  wouldn't  sail,  she  wouldn't  run  under 
her  engine,  she  wouldn't  keep  still  at  her 
anchor  in  harbour,  and  she  would  lie  down 
in  a  half  sea  like  a  balky  horse. 

At  last  I  found  a  man  who  was  looking  for 
that  particular  kind  of  engine  in  a  boat  of 


94  The  Life  Worth  Living 

exactly  her  make.  I  sold  him  the  boat  for 
$1,200,  a  hundred  dollars  less  than  the  hull 
cost  me,  took  his  note  for  the  whole  amount, 
and  gave  him  the  engine. 

He  has  never  liked  me  since. 

Then  I  built  the  Swannanoa,  a  model 
naphtha  cruiser,  in  the  shops  at  Morris 
Heights.  She  was  50  feet  long,  10  feet 
beam,  had  four  berths  in  her  saloon,  a  neat 
galley,  and  toilet  room.  She  was  finished 
like  a  piano  in  mahogany  and  upholstered 
in  silk  and  plush.  She  was  a  thing  of  beauty, 
and  in  every  way  a  success  except  that  she 
was  too  fine  for  comfort  in  rough  cruising  on 
fishing  and  hunting  trips.  After  one  season 
in  Virginia,  I  ran  her  back  to  New  York  and 
sold  her  for  $4,500  within  two  hours  after 
she  touched  the  pier. 

The  original  cost  of  the  genuine  naphtha 
launch  is  high,  but  they  can  be  sold  at  a 
small  loss.  A  thing  is  worth  after  all  what 
other  people  will  give  for  it. 


The  Breath  of  the  Southern  Seas       95 

I  had  now  served  five  years  as  an  appren- 
tice at  boat  building  and  sailing,  and  had 
found  out  what  I  wanted  and  what  I  did  not 
want.  While  I  have  never  given  up  the 
naphtha  launch — I  still  keep  a  4  H.-P.  hunt- 
ing knockabout  for  short  trips  and  a  2  H.-P. 
for  the  river — I  determined  to  build  a  real 
yacht. 

My  five  years'  experience  had  taught  me 
the  limitations  of  small-power  craft,  and  the 
Governmental  regulations  made  a  steam 
yacht  impossible.  I  desired  to  have  a  boat 
of  ocean-going  capacity  of  which  I  could  be 
the  legal  owner  and  sailing  master.  A  mil- 
lionaire may  buy  a  steamer  and  hire  a  crew 
of  efficient  navigators  and  seamen,  but  a 
man  is  never  a  yachtsman  until  he  is  the 
sailing  master  of  his  own  craft  and  knows  the 
responsibility  of  giving  orders  from  her  deck 
that  may  mean  life  or  death. 

In  no  way  can  a  man  so  accurately  ex- 
press his  character  and  temperament  as  on 


9  6  The  Life  Worth  Living 

the  boat  he  builds  if  he  has  had  sufficient 
experience  to  understand  the  language  of 
the  sea. 

I  planned  a  schooner  yacht  of  ocean- 
going tonnage,  yet  of  such  light  draught  she 
could  thread  her  way  amid  the  labyrinths  of 
sand  shoals,  mud-flats,  marshes  and  creeks 
that  make  the  home  of  the  wild  fowl  in  Tide- 
water Virginia. 

Five  things  I  tried  to  express  in  this  boat — 
solid  comfort,  safety,  economy,  utility  and 
beauty.  I  planned  her  80  feet  long,  20  feet 
beam,  and  3  feet  draught;  and  the  lowest 
estimate  I  could  get  on  her  in  New  York  and 
vicinity  wTas  $11,000,  without  sails. 

This  sum  was  beyond  my  purse.  I  came 
down  to  the  Chesapeake  and  found  Mr.  E.  J. 
Tull,  of  Pocomoke,  Maryland,  an  efficient 
builder  of  merchant  work  boats.  He  built 
her  hull.  Her  iron  and  brass  work  I  had 
done  in  New  York,  and  her  sails  were  made 
at   Crisfield.     When   she    was   finished    and 


The  Breath  of  the  Southern  Seas       97 

launched  she  had  cost  me  $3,500,  and  I  put 
a  naphtha  tender  on  her  davits  at  an  addi- 
tional cost  of  $600. 

The  decks  fore  and  aft  took  30  feet  of  her 
length.  I  built  a  cabin  over  the  50  feet  amid- 
ships. This  gave  me  head  room  of  six  feet 
six  inches,  and  guaranteed  ample  light  and 
ventilation  for  winter  and  summer  cruises  in 
Southern  waters.  The  flush  deck  schooner 
gives  poor  light  and  ventilation.  I  placed 
in  her  forty-six  bull's-eye  windows,  one  row  in 
her  cabin  walls,  and  one  row  in  her  hull  below 
decks.  Her  interior  is  always  as  bright  and 
cheerful  as  a  house.  The  50-foot  house  gave 
me  on  one  side  of  the  companion  way  a  tri- 
angular toilet  room  five  feet  long,  and  the 
other  side  a  similar  room  for  wash  basin  and 
water  cooler.  The  main  saloon  is  16  feet 
square  with  four  seat  berths  and  is  lighted 
by  sixteen  windows.  It  is  large  enough  for  a 
sideboard,  writing  desk,  music  box,  piano,  a 
large  dining-table,  arm  chairs  and  a  stove. 


98  The  Life  Worth  Living 

Next  to  the  saloon  cabin  are  two  large 
state-rooms  on  either  side  of  the  hall,  each 
12x8  feet,  containing  full  beds,  writing 
desk,  a  case  of  drawers,  a  clothes  closet  and 
wash  basin  with  running  water.  Next  to 
these  is  another  large  state-room  8x8  feet 
and  a  pantry  opposite,  6x8  feet.  Next  to 
the  pantry  is  the  galley,  8x8.  Opposite 
the  galley  is  the  refrigerator  and  the  cold 
storage  pantry,  4x8  feet,  and  alongside  of 
this  the  first-mate's  state-room  opening  into 
the  crew's  quarters,  8x16  feet.  Under  the 
forward  deck  are  the  oil-tanks  for  naphtha 
and  kerosene,  the  chain  lockers  and  crew's 
toilet  room. 

In  summer  an  awning,  80  feet  long,  covers 
the  entire  ship,  and  iron  ventilators  are  set 
in  openings  over  the  saloon  and  each  state- 
room to  catch  every  breath  of  wind.  Her 
interior  is  finished  with  pine  paneling  painted 
white,  trimmed  in  gold;  and  her  upholstery 
is  in  dark  scarlet  corduroy.     The  odd  spaces 


The  Breath  of  the  Southern  Seas       99 

are  utilized  in  the  construction  of  eighteen 
closets  and  twelve  large  drawers.  Under  her 
after  decks  are  built  three  water-tanks  which 
give  running  water  in  four  state-rooms,  the 
wash-room,  galley  and  crew's  quarters. 

I  attained  safety  in  constructing  her  of 
the  best  and  the  heaviest  material.  Her 
outside  skin  is  of  2 -inch  heart  pine,  her  ribs 
4-inch  oak  doubled,  and  her  inside  skin  2 -inch 
heart  pine.  Her  planking  outside  and  inside 
is  fastened  to  her  ribs  with  6 -inch  galvanized 
iron  spikes.  Her  crossbeams  overhead  are 
6  and  8 -inch  heart  pine.  Her  masts  are 
single  sticks,  the  foremast  80  feet  and  the 
mainmast  72  feet,  and  she  is  rigged  with  the 
Chesapeake  Buckeye  Sharp  Sail,  the  safest 
and  most  powerful  sail  that  can  be  put  on  a 
boat  for  heavy  work  in  winter  gales. 

This  Buckeye  rig  gave  me  the  most  eco- 
nomical yacht  that  could  be  built.  It  costs 
only  $30  to  put  a  new  set  of  running  rigging 
on  her,  and  I  never  hire  more  than  two  men 


ioo  The  Life  Worth  Living 

and  a  boy  for  the  crew.  I  pay  one  of  these 
men,  the  first  mate,  $50  a  month.  He  is  an 
experienced  sea-dog  and  an  expert  hunter 
and  guide.  The  cook,  the  second  man,  costs 
$16  a  month,  and  a  cabin  boy,  $8.  We  can 
keep  her  in  commission  six  months  of  the 
year  at  a  total  cost,  including  provisions,  of 
S7 50,  which  is  cheaper  than  we  can  live 
ashore. 

Such  a  craft  is  the  most  useful  boat  in 
Virginia  waters  a  man  can  build.  She  will 
go  into  more  places  and  do  more  things  than 
any  other  boat  of  her  size  afloat.  She  is  so 
powerfully  built  that  she  stands  up  straight 
on  a  sand-bar  or  mud-flat  as  comfortably  as 
afloat  and  without  damage.  We  can  anchor 
on  the  feeding  grounds  of  wild  fowl  where  the 
tide  leaves  her  high  and  dry  twice  a  day,  and 
stay  as  long  as  we  like.  She  is  a  powerful  sea 
boat  when  she  drops  her  centreboard  and 
draws  10  feet  of  water,  and  if  overtaken  in  such 
a  storm  at  sea  that  she  could  not  live,  she  can 


The  Breath  of  the  Southern  Seas     101 

lift  her  board,  and  in  3  feet  of  water  walk  up 
on  the  beach  and  land  her  passengers  in 
safety  to  them,  if  she  lose  her  own  life. 

That  she  has  beautiful  lines  I  leave  her 
picture  to  say. 

The  only  weakness  of  such  a  craft  is  that 
she  is  not  so  fast  as  the  full  gaff-rigged 
schooner  in  the  light  airs  of  summer.  And 
yet  in  four  years'  cruising  in  Virginia  waters 
I  have  never  brushed  up  against  any  boat  of 
her  size  of  any  rig  that  has  been  able  to  keep 
up  with  her,  though  I  have  never  tried  her 
with  anything  except  working  vessels. 

It  is  a  peculiar  pleasure,  as  well  as  an  ele- 
mental education  in  the  fundamental  things 
of  life,  to  fit  out  such  a  boat  for  a  month's 
cruise.  It  takes  her  crew  of  three  about  a 
week  to  fit  her  sails,  fill  her  water-tanks,  coal 
and  wood  bunkers,  and  stock  her  refrigerator 
and  pantry.  We  make  list  after  list  of  the 
things  needed,  and  when  ten  miles  off  shore 
always  find  we  have  left  behind  some  of  the 


102  The  Life  Worth  Living 

most  important  of  the  little  things  we  are 
sure  to  need  first.  My  wife  has  become  an 
expert  at  this  work  with  four  years'  experi- 
ence. The  man  who  loves  the  water  is  thrice 
happy  if  his  wTife  has  similar  tastes  or  has 
the  adaptability  necessary  to  acquire  them. 
I  can  safely  say  that  the  happiest  hours  of 
our  married  life  have  been  on  board  this 
schooner  yacht.  On  her  long  graceful  bow 
are  carved  in  oak  on  either  side  the  smil- 
ing face  of  a  negro  looking  at  a  row  of 
flying  ducks,  symbolic  of  her  name  and 
habitat. 

I  was  anxious  to  get  the  opinion  of  my 
sea-dog,  Captain  George  Isdell,  on  this  boat 
when  he  first  brought  her  home  from  her 
cradle  at  Pocomoke  where  she  was  born  in 
December,  1897. 

His  face  was  wreathed  in  smiles.  Such 
men  are  always  blunt  and  plain  spoken  to 
the  point  of  rudeness  when  they  talk  about 
the  qualities  of  a  boat.     They  find  her  weak 


The  Breath  of  the  Southern  Seas     103 

spots  in  twenty-four  hours,  and  tell  you  with 
authority  what  she  is  worth. 

"  How  is  she,  George? "  I  asked  as  I  sprang 
up  her  steps  the  day  she  arrived. 

"  She's  a  Jim-dandy !"  he  cried  with  a  grin. 
"  She  goes  through  the  water  slicker' n  a  eel. 
She  stands  right  up  in  a  blow  and  leaves  a 
white  streak  behind  her  as  far  as  you  can  see." 

And  so  I  found  her. 

When  all  is  ready  for  the  winter  cruise, 
and  we  had  said  good-bye  for  a  month  to  the 
little  world  on  shore,  we  began  to  set  her  big 
white  sails. 

I  take  a  hand  with  the  boys  clearing  her 
decks  and  storing  everything  snug.  Her 
gunning  boats  and  decoys  are  slung  in  on 
deck  and  her  tenders  on  her  davits. 

"  It  looks  nasty  in  the  nor 'west — we're 
goin'  to  have  weather,"  was  George's  proph- 
ecy, as  we  swung  the  big  forty-foot  boom  of 
her  foresail  up  from  its  saddle  and  lifted  it 
to  the  highest  reach  of  her  canvas. 


104  The  Life  Worth  Living 

"  Well,  we'll  hustle  and  get  to  the  grounds 
and  then  let  the  north  wind  howl,"  I  replied. 
"That's  what  we  want  for  the  ducks." 

As  we  swung  out  into  the  channel  and 
headed  for  the  Chesapeake  Bay,  black 
scurrying  clouds  from  the  north  came  sweep- 
ing down  and  obscured  the  sun.  In  a  quar- 
ter of  an  hour  the  bay  was  a  white  smother. 
I  heard  her  new  steel  shrouds  crack  as  her 
tall  masts  heeled  over  and  tested  their 
temper. 

"That's  only  the  lanyards  finding  them- 
selves," said  George. 

"Do  you  think  we'll  have  to  reef  her?"  I 
asked. 

"Na — sir,  she  don't  know  it's  a  blowm' 
with  only  them  three  sails.  She  wants  a 
thirty-mile  breeze  to  show  you  what  she 
can  do." 

And  we  got  it. 

She  swept  down  the  dark  waters  of  the 
bay  like  a  great  white  startled  swan,   her 


The  Breath  of  the  Southern  Seas      105 

lower  row  of  windows  tinder  water,  leaving 
a  white  thread  of  foam  behind  her  that  you 
could  see  for  a  mile. 

"Time  her  now  between  these  seven-mile 
buoys!"  cried  George,  as  we  flashed  by  a  red 
can  bobbing  up  and  down  in  a  mass  of  spray. 

I  looked  at  my  watch.  Heavens,  how  she 
flew!  She  was  alive,  and  the  wind  seemed 
the  breath  of  her  joyous  soul.  As  I  held  her 
wheel,  I  could  feel  the  beat  of  her  heart  and 
the  quiver  of  her  nerves.  When  I  moved  it, 
she  was  as  sensitive  to  my  hand  as  a  maiden 
to  the  touch  of  her  lover.  There  is  some- 
thing about  sailboats  that  steam  craft  can 
never  imitate,  something  that  links  them  to 
Nature  and  makes  their  movements  part  of 
the  throb  of  universal  life.  The  man  who 
has  felt  his  heart  quicken  to  the  rhythm  of 
this  joy  will  never  forget  it,  nor  prove  false 
to  the  love  born  in  that  hour. 

"Now,  your  watch  again!"  cried  George 
as  we  flashed  past  another  buoy. 


106  The  Life  Worth  Living 

"Twenty-eight  minutes,"  I  answered. 

"Seven  miles  in  twenty-eight  minutes; 
she's  a  peach!  That's  mor'n  fourteen  miles 
an  hour.  There  ain't  a  boat  afloat  can  beat 
her  in  a  gale." 

In  four  hours  and  a  half  we  made  the  forty 
mile  run,  crossing  the  long  mud-flats  with 
only  the  jib  set.  She  swung  to  her  anchor 
at  sundown  on  the  ducking  grounds,  and 
when  her  jib  ran  down  with  a  crash,  a  great 
flock  of  brant  rose  with  a  chorus  of  protest 
that  rang  over  the  waters  like  the  baying  of 
a  thousand  hounds.  The  flock  was  two 
miles  long  and  three  hundred  feet  deep  and 
their  flight  darkened  the  sky  like  a  storm 
cloud. 

"Never  mind,  old  boys,  we'll  give  you 
something  to  talk  about  to-morrow  if  this 
wind  holds  to  the  nor'west,"  was  George's 
answer  to  their  cry. 


CHAPTER  XI 
In  the  Haunts  of  Wild  Fowl 

We  had  dropped  our  anchor  in  the  deep 
water  at  the  head  of  a  channel  in  one  of  the 
innumerable  shallow  bays  of  Tidewater 
Virginia.  We  were  in  the  midst  now  of  the 
haunts  of  almost  every  wild  fowl  that  spreads 
his  wings  along  the  Atlantic  Seaboard. 

The  prayer  of  the  huntsman  in  search  of 
ducks,  geese  and  brant  is  for  cold,  stormy 
weather. 

It  is  impossible  to  get  many  wild  fowl  in 
mild  weather.  They  will  not  decoy,  but 
will  drift  around  the  bay  in  great  masses 
talking,  laughing,  screaming  and  joking  at 
fool  hunters  they  can  see  plainly  squatting 
in  blinds  surrounded  by  wooden  humbug 
birds.     They  never  come  closer  than  a  mile 


ioS  The  Life  Worth  Living 

in  such  weather,  and  what  a  man  says  01 
these  days  would  not  do  to  go  in  a  Sunday 
School  book. 

But  when  a  stiff  breeze  blows  and  the 
decoys  begin  to  nod  and  bob  in  the  water, 
with  life  in  every  movement,  then  we  can 
fool  Mr.  Duck  and  Mr.  Brant,  stock  our 
pantry  for  rainy  days  and  make  glad  the 
heart  of  friends  in  town  with  the  call  of  the 
expressman. 

I  never  knew  how  much  beautiful  weather 
there  was  in  winter  until  I  began  cruising  for 
ducks  and  geese.  I  had  an  idea  before  that 
about  half  the  days  of  our  winter  life  are 
bleak  and  stormy.  I  have  found  by  nine 
years'  experience  that  on  an  average  there 
are  about  four  days  in  each  winter  month  in 
which  the  weather  is  bad  enough  to  make  a 
good  day  for  ducks.  If  we  get  more  than 
four  days  of  stormy  weather  in  a  month,  fit 
for  good  shooting,  it  is  a  streak  of  extraordi- 
nary luck.     And  if  one  or  two  of  those  four 


1    NEVER    KNEW    HOW    MUCH    BEAUTIFUL    WEATHER    THERE    WAS    IN 

winter" 


In  the  Haunts  of  Wild  Fowl        109 

grand  storm  days  do  not  fall  on  Sundays,  it 
is  downright  rabbit's  foot  luck. 

At  night  in  the  snug  crew's  quarters  for- 
ward, there  is  the  hum  of  sportsman  indus- 
try. The  boys  are  loading  shells  with  number 
two  shot  for  brant. 

The  wind  is  howling  a  steady  gale  from 
the  north  and  increasing  the  length  of  its 
gusts  with  steady  persistence. 

"Hear  them  shrouds  talkin'?"  cried 
George  with  a  broad  grin.  "  If  this  wind 
hangs  on  here  till  mornin'  we'll  burn  them 
brant.  Confound  'em,  they're  the  most 
tantalizin'  bird  that  ever  pitched  in  this  bay. 
I  never  killed  a  one  of  'em  the  whole  of  last 
winter.  There  were  no  younguns  among 
'em.  It's  funny.  Some  years  there's  thou- 
sands of  younguns.  But  last  year  I  didn't 
hear  the  squawk  of  a  dozen,  and  you  can't 
kill  an  old  brant.  This  year  the  bay's  full 
of  'em  and  we'll  burn  'em  up  to-morrow — 
see  if  we  don't." 


no  The  Life  Worth  Living 

"I  hope  so"  I  replied.  "They  made  me 
mad  enough  last  winter's  cruise,  flying  all  over 
me,  laughing  and  joking  about  us  the  whole 
month." 

"  Yes,  and  they  kept  it  up  till  they  left  in 
the  spring.  Nobody  killed  any  the  whole 
season.  But  if  we  don't  have  brant  for  sup- 
per to-morrow  night,  I'll  eat  my  old  cap." 

When  George  was  willing  to  stake  his  old 
slouch  cap  with  its  long  visor,  that  looked 
like  a  duck's  bill,  he  was  in  dead  earnest. 

"If  the  wind  will  just  hold  on!"  I  ex- 
claimed, with  sad  memories  of  high  hopes 
many  times   shattered  before. 

"Don't  worry.  You'll  git  all  you  want 
to-morrow.  It'll  be  a  question  whether  we 
can  git  to  the  blind.  Don't  you  hear  them 
flaws  gittin'  longer  and  longer?  That's  been 
goin'  on  all  day.  It'll  be  as  long  goin'  as  it 
was  comin'  and  it  ain't  got  nigh  the  top  yit." 

Sure  enough,  the  next  morning,  as  we  ate 
breakfast  by  lamplight   at    5.30,    the  wind 


In  the  Haunts  of  Wild  Fowl        in 

was  howling  and  shrieking  through  the  rig- 
ging like  a  thousand  devils. 

George  looked  grave.  I  asked  what  trou- 
bled his  mind. 

"  I'm  study  in'  'bout  gittin'  to  that  blind. 
We're  goin'  to  the  Boss  blind  and  we'll  have 
a  tussle  to  make  it  with  the  wind  on  our 
quarter.  We  ought  to  'a'  gone  to  the  wind- 
'ard  further  before  we  anchored." 

And  we  did  have  a  tussle. 

We  took  off  half  our  decoys  from  the  gun- 
ning dink  and  with  two  ten-foot  oars  began 
to  shove  our  craft  out  over  the  foaming 
storm-tossed  waters.  It  was  all  we  could  do 
to  stand  up  against  the  wind ;  and  with  both 
oars  fixed  on  the  bottom,  the  strength  of  two 
men  could  barely  move  the  fifteen-foot,  light 
cedar  boat.  It  took  us  an  hour  to  push  her 
three-quarters  of  a  mile  to  the  blind.  It  was 
freezing  cold,  but  we  were  both  wet  with 
sweat  when  we  got  there. 

The  Boss  blind  is  a  famous  one  in  this  bay, 


1 12  The  Life  Worth  Living 

that  stands  far  out  on  the  mud-flats  near  the 
edge  of  a  ship  channel.  It  was  first  stuck 
there  by  Uncle  Nathan  Cobb,  the  king  of 
wild  fowl  hunters  in  Tidewater  Virginia, 
nicknamed  the  "Old  Boss"  by  his  admirers. 

This  particular  bay  has  4,000  acres  of  mud- 
flats on  which  the  wild  celery  grass  grows, 
furnishing  rich  food  for  the  birds.  There 
are  many  blinds  of  cedar  bushes  stuck  over 
its  wide  .sweep,  but  the  old  Boss  blind  is  yet 
the  king  of  them  all.  It  was  placed  there 
fifty  years  ago  with  consummate  skill,  in  the 
track  of  the  brant  and  ducks,  and  all  the 
ingenuity  of  rival  hunters  has  never  been 
able  to  place  a  blind  anywhere  in  that  4,000 
acres  to  interfere  with  the  flight  of  birds  that 
pass  it  in  stormy  weather. 

The  tide  was  just  right.  It  made  high 
water  at  daylight.  This  gave  us  the  whole 
of  the  ebb  tide,  the  low  water  and  the  first 
movement  of  the  flood  tide  for  shooting. 
The  tides  are  right  for  blind  shooting  on  the 


In  the  Haunts  of  Wild  Fowl        113 

two  weeks  of  full  and  new  moon,  and  wrong 
on  the  two  quarters. 

As  the  waters  fall  off  the  flats  the  birds 
come  in  to  feed  on  the  grass  as  soon  as  they 
can  reach  bottom  with  their  bills,  and,  when 
hungry  from  a  long  run  of  high  tides,  they 
come  out  hours  before  they  can  reach  bot- 
tom in  search  of  shoal  places. 

We  had  just  put  out  our  decoys  as  the  sun 
rose,  and  were  pushing  into  the  blind,  when 
a  broadbill  swept  in  range  before  I  had 
loaded  a  gun. 

"They'll  come  to-day  like  chickens!"  cried 

George. 

"There's  a  blackduck  in  the  decoys!"  I 
whispered,  as  he  handed  me  my  number  ten 
gun.  I  bagged  him,  and  then  for  an  hour 
we  were  kept  busy  with  the  broadbill  and 
blackducks. 

At  last  a  flock  of  brant  of  about  two  hun- 
dred headed  in  straight  for  us.  I  seized  my 
second  gun,  loaded  with  number  two  shot,  and 


ii4  The  Life  Worth  Living 

made  ready.  They  were  flying  low  in  the 
teeth  of  the  gale.  Now  I  could  see  their 
long,  black  necks  and  snowy  feathers  around 
their  legs,  and  they  looked  as  big  as  geese. 
As  they  drew  nearer,  with  every  throat  in 
full  cry,  the  noise  sounded  like  the  roar  of  a 
fire  sweeping  a  canebrake,  exploding  the 
joints  of  two  hundred  canes  a  second!  I 
held  my  breath,  and  as  they  swept  in  range 
about  thirty  yards  from  the  blind,  I  blazed 
away,  bang!  bang!  I  expected  to  see  it  rain 
brant.     I  hadn't  touched  a  feather! 

"Well,  I'll  be 1"  exclaimed  George. 

I  had  the  dry-grins,  and  looked  down  at 
my  gun  to  see  if  it  was  really  a  gun,  when  I 
noticed  my  hands  trembling  like  a  leaf. 

"  Brant  fever,"  was  George's  dry  remark. 
"  You  must  git  over  that,  if  we  are  to  do  our 
duty  here  to-day." 

"I'll  maul  'em  next  time,"  I  promised. 

In  half  an  hour  another  bunch  swung  in 
and  I  brought  down  three  with  the  first  bar- 


In  the  Haunts  of  Wild  Fowl        115 

rel  and  two  with  the  second.  Then  for  five 
hours  we  had  the  sport  of  which  I  had 
dreamed. 

When  the  tide  had  ebbed  off  and  left  the 
flats  dry,  we  counted  our  game,  and  we  had 
17  brant,  16  blackducks  and  10  broadbill,  a 
total  of  43,  as  fat  and  toothsome  birds  as  ever 
tickled  the  palate  of  man. 

When  the  tide  began  to  flow  back  in  flood 
on  the  flats  the  wind  had  died  down  to  a 
gentle  breeze.  We  took  up  our  decoys, 
stowed  our  birds  under  decks,  set  our  little 
sail,  and  as  the  sun  sank  in  a  sea  of  scarlet 
glory  swept  slowly  and  contentedly  back  to 
the  Dixie. 

It  was  a  red-letter  day — one  to  tell  young 
folks  about  in  the  far-away  years  when  one 
becomes  a  grandpa  and  must  ask  his  son  for 
permission  to  venture  out  on  a  stormy  day. 

Then  followed  a  week  of  tantalizingly 
beautiful  weather  in  which  the  ducks  and 
geese  and  brant  had  it  all  their  own  way. 


n6  The  Life  Worth  Living 

Some  days  we  would  get  a  half  dozen — 
oftener  two  or  three.  But  the  glorious 
moonlit  nights,  with  the  chorus  of  birds 
chattering  and  feeding  about  us,  had  their 
compensations  of  soul  peace  and  dreams. 

And  then  the  dinners  on  board!  Of 
course,  salt  water  gives  a  man  an  appetite 
that  balks  at  few  things  containing  nourish- 
ment for  the  human  body,  yet  it  is  equally 
true  that  one  can  live  as  royally  on  a  yacht 
in  Tidewater  Virginia  as  in  the  palace  of  a 
king.  And  the  way  my  wife  cooks  brant 
and  ducks  and  fixes  diamond-back  terrapin 
on  board  a  boat  is  a  secret  beyond  the  ken 
of  any  hotel  kitchen. 

This  is  how  she  says  it  is  done.  The  birds 
are  dressed  and  placed  to  soak  in  salt  water 
five  hours.  Then  they  are  rubbed  thor- 
oughly with  salt  and  pepper,  and  basted 
about  two  hours  in  a  very  hot  stove  until 
so  tender  you  can  stick  a  fork  into  the  breast 
and  turn  it  easily. 


In  the  Haunts  of  Wild  Fowl        117 

We  are  ready  now  for  dinner  at  6.30. 
The  saloon  is  bright  and  cheerful,  and  the 
stove  glows  with  a  bed  of  red-hot  coals.  We 
start  the  music  box,  and  take  our  places  at 
the  four  sides  of  the  table.  There  are  four 
of  us — my  wife,  our  two  boys,  aged  fourteen 
and  ten,  and  myself,  but  we  figure  for  the 
needs  of  eight  normal  appetites.  The  first 
course  is  fat  oysters  on  the  half-shell,  picked 
up  by  the  bushel  on  the  flats  at  low  tide  by 
the  cook.  The  oyster  plates  give  way  to 
diamond-back  terrapin  stew.  We  catch  our 
own  terrapin.  They  cost  us  nothing  except 
the  fun  of  catching  them.  When  I  strike 
terrapin  at  a  banquet  in  New  York  I 
generally  have  to  ask  what  it  is.  After 
the  terrapin,  the  cook  sends  in  the  ducks — 
four  browned,  juicy,  smoking  balls  on  a 
big  game  platter!  It  takes  a  whole  duck 
for  each  ravenous  appetite — meat  so  deli- 
cious, so  tender  and  toothsome  it  fairly 
melts  in  your  mouth !    We  serve  with  grape 


n8  The  Life  Worth  Living 

jelly,  candied  sweet  potatoes,  and  steaming 
hot  coffee. 

I  dream  of  these  dinners  the  other  eleven 
months  of  the  year.  How  far  away  and  un- 
important the  land  world  seems  now!  We 
are  fifteen  miles  off  shore — fifteen  miles  from 
a  post-office,  telegraph  line,  or  a  railroad. 
We  never  see  a  newspaper,  know  nothing 
about  what  is  going  on  in  the  big,  steaming, 
festering  cities,  and  have  ceased  to  care  to 
know.  Our  world  is  now  a  beautiful  bay, 
fed  from  the  sea  by  two  pulsing  tides  a  day. 
Only  the  winds  and  tides  are  important. 
How  vain  and  stupid  and  unreal  seem  the 
vulgar  ambitions  of  men  and  women  who  herd 
in  those  big  iron  and  stone-bound  hives  and 
strive  with  one  another! 

It  was  here  that  the  sense  of  the  pity,  the 
pathos,  and  the  folly  of  this  struggle  first 
stole  into  my  heart,  and  I  ceased  to  care  to 
be  great.  I  used  to  think  that  I  was  carry- 
ing a  large  part  of  the  world  on  my  shoul- 


In  the  Haunts  of  Wild  Fowl        119 

ders,  and  if  I  dropped  it,  things  would  stop 
with  a  crash.  Here  in  this  mysterious  realm 
of  sun  and  moon  and  star,  wind  and  tide, 
bay  and  sea,  sand  beach  and  solemn  sweep- 
ing marsh,  how  small  and  poor  that  other 
world,  and  how  little  it  seemed  to  need  me! 

Swiftly  the  days  fly.  Ten  days  go  flashing 
by  as  a  dream,  and  we  rub  our  eyes  in  vain 
effort  to  account  for  them. 

We  waked  one  morning  and  found  that 
old  Neptune  had  hauled  his  wind  to  the 
southeast  in  the  night  and  drawn  about  us 
the  grey  mantle  of  mystery,  a  fog.  All  day 
long  it  hung  on,  dense  and  clinging,  putting 
out  the  light  of  sun,  moon,  star  and  friendly 
lighthouse.  The  birds  never  moved  a  wing 
or  uttered  a  cry.  They  huddled  in  groups 
wherever  the  fog  caught  them.  Far  out 
over  the  sand  beach  we  could  hear  the 
deep  bay  of  the  ocean  hounds  crying  their 
distress.  It  was  no  use  to  grumble.  We 
had  learned  to  take  things  as  they  came. 


120  The  Life  Worth  Living 

A  fog  meant  a  stay  indoors :  talk  and  dream 
and  read.  From  our  little  library  we  drew 
forth  our  treasures  and  forgot  the  fog. 

Next  morning  it  was  just  the  same. 

"  Look  out  for  weather  when  this  clears 
up,"  was  George's  greeting  as  I  walked  into 
the  crew's  quarters  after  breakfast. 

"What  sort  of  weather?" 

"Cold,  freezin',  goose  weather.  I  see 
them  geese  feedin'  out  there  in  the  sink  every 
day  the  last  week.  If  this  wind  hauls  into 
the  nor'west  to-night,  the  fog  will  lift,  and 
we'll  talk  goose  talk  in  that  sink  blind  in  a 
way  that'll  make  your  heart  nutter  to- 
morrow." 

Next  morning  it  was  freezing  and  the 
wind  was  howling  a  thirty-mile  gale  from 
the  north. 

We  went  to  the  goose  blind  located  in  the 
sink,  a  deep  place  in  the  mud-flats  that  rarely 
goes  dry. 

"The    wind's   just    right,"   said   George. 


In  the  Haunts  of  Wild  Fowl        121 

"Every  goose  oughter  pass  this  blind  to- 
day. The  wind's  blowin'  straight  across 
their  track,  the  flocks  can't  hear  our 
guns,  and  we  can  hammer  'em  the  whole 
tide." 

The  goose  is  the  wildest  and  smartest  of 
all  the  fowl  of  our  coast  and  the  most  diffi- 
cult to  kill.  I  had  shot  only  four  in  several 
years'  outing  in  Virginia,  and  was  crazy  for  a 
storm  day  in  their  track. 

At  last  it  had  come.  The  wind  was  blow- 
ing now  a  furious  gale — so  strong  were  its 
gusts  it  was  almost  impossible  to  shove  out 
of  our  blind  against  it. 

The  first  flock  of  geese  show  by  their  flight 
the  track  they  will  follow  for  the  day.  The 
sound  of  one  gun  heard  by  them  will  change 
their  plans  instantly  and  cause  them  to 
take  a  new  course  ten  or  twelve  miles  in  the 
opposite   direction. 

But  we  had  them  to-day.  The  wind  was 
at  right  angles  to  their  course,  and  they  could 


122  The  Life  Worth  Living 

hear  nothing.  The  first  flock  came  as 
straight  for  our  blind  as  an  arrow. 

What  a  sight,  as  they  came  honk!  honk! 
in  long,  streaming  lines,  their  necks  stretched 
and  their  big,  ten-foot  wings  battling  with 
the  storm! 

Crack!  Crack!  went  four  barrels  in  per- 
fect time,  sounding  like  pop-guns  in  the  howl 
of  the  wind,  and  three  big  fellows  tumbled. 
When  they  came  swirling  down  it  looked  as 
though  we  had  knocked  out  a  piece  of  the 
sky. 

We  pushed  rapidly  after  them,  and  yet  so 
terrific  was  the  wind  they  were  swept  a  hun- 
dred yards  to  the  leeward  before  we  could 
reach  them.  Then  we  had  a  battle  royal  to 
get  back  to  the  blind.  We  had  barely 
started  shoving  with  our  oars  with  all  the 
power  of  every  muscle,  when  a  flock  of  over 
fifty  geese  circled  over  our  decoys.  And 
two  big  flocks  followed  close  on  their  heels. 
Hundreds  had  passed  before  we  got  back. 


In  the  Haunts  of  Wild  Fowl        123 

Suddenly  the  sky  was  darkened  with  such 
a  flock  of  blackducks  as  I  had  never  seen  at 
close  range.  There  must  have  been  a  thou- 
sand of  them.  They  sailed  straight  in  and 
pitched  in  our  decoys  and  rolled  up  in  a 
great  black  sheet  within  easy  gunshot. 

Trembling  with  excitement,  I  raised  to 
make  the  one  mighty  pot-shot  of  my  life  and 
kill  a  hundred,  when  George  seized  my  arm. 

"Don't  shoot.  There's  a  hundred  geese 
comin'  right  in.  Don't  fool  with  blackducks 
— this  is  goose  day." 

I  let  them  alone  and  killed  two  geese  out 
of  the  bunch  that  came,  but  I've  regretted 
that  lost  shot  into  those  blackducks  a  thou- 
sand times  since,  when  they  have  been  tan- 
talizing me  on  fair  days  with  their  insolent 
display  of  knowledge. 

When  the  tide  had  ebbed  off  at  the  end  of 
three  hours  we  had  seventeen  geese  that 
weighed  214  pounds.  We  hung  them  up  on 
the  big  foreboom  of  the  Dixie,  George  and  I 


124  The  Life  Worth  Living 

crouched  among  them,  and  one  of  the  boys 
snapped  the  camera  at  us. 

It  was  a  day  never  to  be  forgotten,  and  it 
will  be  many  moons  before  we  see  its  like 
again. 

It  was  the  harbinger  of  the  greatest  freeze 
Tidewater  Virginia  ever  saw  in  its  three 
hundred  years  of  English  history,  and  the 
geese  knew  it  was  coming. 

Some  winters  ice  does  not  form  at  all  in 
these  waters.  As  a  rule,  it  freezes  for  two 
or  three  days  in  February  and  then  thaws 
quickly.  Sometimes,  once  in  ten  years 
perhaps,  the  bays  will  be  frozen  for  a  week 
at  a  time.  But  now  the  mercury  suddenly 
dropped  to  nine  degrees  below  zero,  turning 
a  rainstorm  into  hail,  and  freezing  our 
soaked  sails  as  hard  as  a  rock.  In  three  days 
the  bay  was  frozen  solid  and  the  ebb  and 
flow  of  the  tides  began  to  pile  the  ice  against 
every  obstruction  in  its  path.  It  trimmed 
our  blinds  off  as  smoothly  as  though  a.  big 


In  the  Haunts  of  Wild  Fowl        125 

steel  razor  had  done  the  work,  and  in  four 
days  the  bay  looked  like  a  picture  of  the 
Arctic  Ocean,  and  our  yacht  like  a  craft 
caught  in  the  ice  in  search  of  the  North  Pole. 

We  lifted  her  big  anchors  on  the  catheads 
and  tried  to  patiently  wait  for  a  thaw. 
Each  day  we  expected  a  change,  but  it  only 
grew  worse.  Two  storms  had  met  on  the 
coast  and  all  weather  charts  were  smashed. 

The  day  before  this  freeze,  guests  had  un- 
expectedly arrived  from  New  York,  and  the 
drain  on  our  pantry  had  exhausted  the  sup- 
ply of  fundamentals.  At  the  end  of  ten 
days  we  were  out  of  wood,  out  of  coal,  out 
of  oil  and  short  of  rations.  Then  we  found 
that  goose  bacon  is  better  than  Swift's  or 
Armour's. 

The  whole  sweep  of  Tidewater  Virginia 
was  a  white  desolation  of  ice;  the  Chesa- 
peake Bay  was  frozen  eighteen  miles  from 
shore  to  shore;  and  the  ice  was  packed  out 
sixteen  miles  into  the  Atlantic  Ocean. 


126  The  Life  Worth  Living 

We  had  to  knock  up  the  small  boats,  tear 
the  shelving  out  of  the  forecastle,  and  split 
up  our  decoys  for  wood  with  which  to  cook 
two  short  meals  a  day.  It  was  fifteen  days 
before  the  ice  field  thawed  under  the  South- 
ern sun  and  rain  and  began  to  move  out  to 
sea.  The  rain  had  at  last  rotted  it  enough 
for  our  big  anchor  chain  to  cut  it.  So  we 
dropped  old  "Sleep  Easy,"  and  his  chain 
cut  the  4,000-acre  field  in  two  and  it  passed 
harmlessly  by. 

It  was  a  rough  experience,  but  was  worth 
more  than  it  cost.  We  had  met  the  ice 
king  clad  in  his  white  robes  of  omnipotent 
power.  We  had  seen  the  miracle  his  breath 
could  work  on  the  face  of  beautiful  wraters. 
In  a  night  he  had  given  to  the  tide  gleaming 
teeth  that  could  bite  an  anchor  chain  in  two 
as  though  it  were  a  straw.  We  had  seen  both 
anchors  on  the  Dixie's  catheads  with  her 
sails  rolled  up.  How  helpless  she  looked  in 
this  abject  surrender! 


In  the  Haunts  of  Wild  Fowl        127 

Strange  noises  filled  the  air.     One  night 
the  flood  tide  pushed  us  out  of  the  channel 
up  on  the  edge  of   the  high  mud-flat.     On 
the   ebb   the   ice   began    to  crowd  its  tons 
against  the  Dixie's   upper   side.     Suddenly 
it  pushed  her  off   the  edge  of   the   channel 
where  she  had  been  caught,  and  when  she  fell 
into  the  deep  water  her  masts  quivered  like 
reeds,  and  the  crash  rang  through  her  hull 
like  the  roar  of  an  earthquake.     We  were  all 
sound  asleep  when  it  happened,  but  the  jump 
out  of  bed  was  unanimous,  and  the  chorus  of 
inquiry  had  the  flavour  of  Chimmey  Fadden's 
famous  remark.     We  had  a  laugh  all  round 
and  went  back  to  sleep. 

Of  all  the  sounds  I  have  ever  heard  a  mov- 
ing ice  field,  crunching  against  the  sides  of  a 
vessel,  is  the  strangest  and  most  thrilling. 
It  comes  like  the  distant,  sonorous  roar  of  a 
storm  sweeping  down  a  mountain  gorge, 
and  yet  it  is  so  close  and  has  such  a  chorus 
of  intermingled  notes  that  there  is  absolutely 


128  The  Life  Worth  Living 

nothing  like  it  in  nature.  The  hollow  body 
of  the  boat  becomes  the  sounding  drum  of  a 
great  musical  instrument,  and  the  Spirit  of 
Winter  sweeps  its  strings  with  trembling, 
crystal  fingers !  We  sit  and  listen  breathless. 
No  master  musician  ever  composed  such 
music  and  no  orchestra  could  be  found  to 
play  it. 

The  lighthouses,  that  had  been  blinking 
their  kindly  eyes  at  us  through  so  many 
long  nights,  seemed  to  have  assumed  now  a 
strange,  glittering  stare,  and  one  night,  when 
the  storm  was  at  its  darkest  and  wildest 
pranks,  the  nearby  light  was  suddenly  ob- 
scured. Great  flocks  of  geese,  brant  and 
ducks,  lost  and  crazed  by  the  storm,  were 
dashing  themselves  in  despair  to  death 
against  the  gleaming  lens. 

I  never  cruise  in  these  waters  and  go  home 
willingly.  When  the  time  comes  to  leave,  I 
feel  like  a  schoolboy  driven  back  to  his  tasks. 

Swiftly  a  month  rolls  away.     Days  seem 


WE  ARE    HOMEWARD   BOUND   NOW;   WITH    HER   BIG  YACHT   ENSIGN 
SET    AFT    AND    HER    COLORS    AT    HER    MASTHEAD  " 


In  the  Haunts  of  Wild  Fowl        129 

but  hours,  and  the  fatal  one  dawns,  the  very 
last  I  dare  to  spend.  There  are  engagements 
to  be  met  back  in  that  dimly  remembered 
little  world  where  they  have  mails,  telegraph 
lines,  railroads  and  newspapers.  How  I  hate 
it  all  now!  I  resolve,  when  I  go  back,  to 
make  a  million  dollars,  sail  away  and  never 
return  except  for  coal  and  water. 

The  order  is  given  to  get  under  way. 
The  boys  beg  for  one  more  day,  but  at  last 
give  up,  begin  to  swallow  lumps  in  their 
throats,  and  fight  to  keep  back  the  tears.  I 
know  my  boys  do  this,  because  their  father 
and  mother  do  the  same  thing  when  they  are 
not  looking. 

We  are  homeward  bound  now,  with  her 
big  yacht  ensign  set  aft  and  her  colors  at  her 
masthead.  Every  heart  is  heavy  and  no 
one  speaks.  We  feel  as  though  we  are  sail- 
ing away  into  a  strange  world. 


CHAPTER  XII 
The  Frozen  Fountain 

All  day  the  wind  has  been  blowing  from 
the  north,  and  dull  grey  clouds  cover  the  sky. 

I  awake  at  home  in  the  morning  to  find  my 
Southland  clothed  in  the  ermine  robe  of  the 
North — more  dazzling  in  beauty,  true;  but 
cold,  still,  white  and  deathlike. 

The  green  leaves  of  the  magnolias  bend 
and  curve  and  shrink  under  their  burden, 
and  their  satin  finger-tips  flash  with  a  strange 
brilliance  against  the  snow's  canvas. 

The  berries  of  the  holly  seem  groups  of 
tiny  altar  candles  smothered  beneath  the 
storm's  blanket. 

When  the  first  boyish  exhilaration  passes — 
the  inheritance  of  childhood's  memories 
— a  feeling  of  sadness  creeps  over  me.     The 


THE  ERMINE  ROBE  OF  THE  NORTH 


The  Frozen  Fountain  131 

house  seems  immense,  and  cold,  though  I 
feel  the  warm  air  pouring  through  the  regis- 
ter and  a  wood  fire  roars  and  crackles  in  the 
open  fireplace.  I  am  mistaken.  The  room 
is  not  cold,  and  a  greater  fear  oppresses  me. 
The  sense  of  chill  must  be  in  my  heart. 
Even  the  glow  of  a  wood  fire  may  not  reach 
the  soul's  hiding-place. 

I  resolve  to  take  a  ride.  The  sweet  breath 
of  the  morning,  the  warmth  of  my  mare's 
glistening  back,  the  quick  beat  of  her  hoof, 
the  pride  of  her  arched  neck,  and  the 
rhythmic  union  of  my  life  with  hers  in  the 
sport  we  both  love — yes,  it  will  warm  me. 

And  then  I  remember  that  the  snow  is 
piled  in  drifts  and  my  Bess  is  from  the 
far  Southland,  a  shining  child  of  the  sun. 
Snow  is  the  only  thing  in  all  nature's  pranks 
that  frightens  her.  When  her  footfall  comes 
back  muffled,  and  the  packed  snow  from  her 
shoes  begins  to  strike  her  breast  and  flanks, 
the  big,  half -human  eyes  turn  and  look  back 


132  The  Life  Worth  Living 

at  me  in  terror.  No,  she  shall  not  suffer:  I 
love  her — and  she  cannot  understand. 

The  water  is  dark  in  the  middle  of  the 
river,  and  I  see  a  widening  fringe  of  ice  along 
the  shores.  The  creek  that  flows  through  the 
lawn  is  dead  and  motionless — a  flashing  sheet 
of  ice.     The  fountains  are  still  and  frozen. 

The  birds  huddle  about  the  door,  silent 
and  dazed.  I  hasten  down  to  grind  some 
corn  for  them  and  pour  it  in  heaps  in  the 
sheltered  places.  They  find  it  quickly.  The 
redbirds  are  first;  the  larks  come  in  droves 
and  eat  as  though  they  are  starved;  and, 
last,  the  mockingbirds  and  wrens. 

I  place  one  pile  deep  down  in  the  glade 
behind  the  garden  for  the  quail  I  have  left 
to  breed  two  coveys  for  the  next  season  in 
the  orchard. 

I  tramp  through  the  snow  back  to  the 
house,  still  struggling  with  a  sense  of  vague 
uneasiness. 

Tired  of  watching  the  fire,   I  go  to  the 


The  Frozen  Fountain  133 

window  and  stand  for  an  hour  gazing  over 
the  freezing  waters.  My  wife  is  softly  play- 
ing the  piano.  Her  music  has  always  been 
a  joy  to  me.  Yet,  somehow,  to-day  each 
sweet  note  is  heavy  with  tears  and  their 
sub-tones  begin  to  stir  memories  of  another 
life  in  another  world.  The  wind  howls  and 
moans  without  and  sweeps  my  soul  now 
with  desolation. 

Yes,  there  is  something  the  matter  with 
me.  Perhaps,  after  all,  I'm  not  well.  Yet 
my  face  is  bronzed  and  hardened  and  every 
muscle  tense  as  steel.  I  never  felt  stronger, 
and  my  heart  beats  with  the  conscious  stroke 
of  new  and  enormous  reserve  powers.  Per- 
haps I  have  come  home  from  hunting  too 
soon.  No,  I'm  just  a  little  tired  of  hunting. 
The  last  quail  I  shot  fluttered  pathetically  in 
my  hand,  and  left  a  tiny  blood -mark  on  my 
finger.  And  I  thought  of  it  afterwards.  I 
did  not  enjoy  the  quail  on  toast  for  break- 
fast quite  as  well  as  usual. 


134  The  Life  Worth  Living 

As  I  stand  looking  down  the  river  in 
brooding  silence,  suddenly  the  Old  Dominion 
steamer  sweeps  around  the  bend,  the  storm 
spray  dashing  against  her  bow,  her  black  and 
yellow  funnel  pouring  a  cloud  of  smoke  into 
the  sky.  Her  deep  bass  voice  breaks  the 
stillness  at  the  sight  of  her  pier.  Three  times 
it  rings  in  triumph  over  the  icy  waters, 
the  summons  of  the  big  world  from  whence 
she  comes,  where  man  has  built  a  home 
beyond  the  frost  line. 

I  know  now,  and  I  begin  to  pack.  I  am 
going  back  to  town. 


CHAPTER  XIII 
The  City's  Lambent  Flame 

The  old  fever  is  in  my  blood.  I  have  not 
lived  it  down.  Why  should  I  strangle  the 
impulse,  if  God  put  it  within?  After  all,  it 
is  His  breath.  This  longing  for  fellowship, 
this  consciousness  of  kinship  with  the  herd 
is  upon  me  and  my  heart  is  beating  to  its 
wild  music.  I  lift  my  head  and  sniff  from 
afar  the  dust  of  their  hoof  beat,  and  my  soul 
answers  with  a  cry. 

On  the  horizon  of  the  night  I  see  the  city's 
lambent  flame,  the  light  that  never  grows 
dim,  the  life  that  never  sleeps. 

Again  I  plunge  into  its  human  tides  and 
feel  the  enfolding  contagion  of  their  animal 
and  spiritual  magnetism.  Again  I  bathe 
in  my  favourite  pool — the  whirlpool  at  Madi- 


136  The  Life  Worth  Living 

son  Square — the  vortex  into  which  swift 
human  rivers  pour  their  waters.  At  this 
spot,  he  who  has  ears  can  always  hear  the 
roar  of  a  Niagara  more  thrilling  than  the 
music  of  the  leap  of  rivers  from  granite  cliffs. 

I  see  the  miles  of  electric  lights  flash 
brighter  than  the  stars,  and  the  glow  and 
splendour  and  mystery  of  it  all  stirs  my  soul. 

Warm  hands  clasp  mine,  and  the  faces  of 
friends  smile  their  greetings. 

I  hear  the  music  of  the  orchestra,  the 
tumult  and  the  shout  of  Broadway  on  gala 
nights  of  grand  opera,  the  voices  of  my 
favourites  singing  as  never  before — and  I 
am  glad. 

I  slip  back  into  my  study  hard  by  the 
Square — I  confess  I  have  always  kept  it 
there — and  turn  up  the  lights  with  a  sneak- 
ing joy  at  my  inconsistency.  I  hate  con- 
sistent people,  anyhow. 


CHAPTER  XIV 

What  is  Life? 

I  have  taken  it  for  granted  that  no  life  is 
worth  discussion  which  is  not  useful;  that 
every  life  worth  the  candle  is  spent  in  the 
service  of  our  loved  ones  and  our  fellow  man, 
to  the  end  that  the  world  in  which  we  live 
shall  be  brighter,  wiser,  or  more  beautiful 
because  we  have  passed  through  it. 

My  search  is  for  the  highest  pathway  of 
this  life,  and  I  am  convinced  that  it  can  only 
be  found  in  the  growth  of  every  power  of 
the  soul  and  the  body  to  the  utmost  reach 
of  their  capacity. 

This  acme  of  living  cannot  be  attained  in 
the  city.  In  the  city  we  are  spendthrifts. 
We  give,  give,  give  and  never  receive.  I  be- 
lieve that  man's   full  growth  will  be  best 


138  The  Life  Worth  Living 

reached  by  spending  one-third  of  his  time  in 
town  and  two-thirds  in  touch  with  Nature. 

To  live  is  to  will.  To  cease  to  will  is  to 
die.  •  He  who  has  ceased  to  will  is  dead 
already — he  may  fool  the  undertaker  for  a 
while,  but  he  is  dead  and  he  ought  to  be 
buried. 

The  gravest  charge  against  the  modern 
city  is  not  merely  that  its  continuous  unrest 
starves  the  soul,  brutalizes  the  senses,  de- 
stroys repose,  develops  insolent  and  savage 
impulses — but  worse  than  all  this,  it  mur- 
ders the  will  and  destroys  personality,  thus 
sapping  the  fountain  of  life.  The  collec- 
tive instincts  of  the  herd -groups  in  which 
we  move  strangle  at  last  the  individual,  and 
man  becomes  but  a  grain  of  dust  blown 
hither  and  thither  by  the  breath  of  a  crowd. 

The  city's  chief  crimes  are  noise  and  un- 
rest. The  human  soul  cannot  grow  in  an 
uproar.  The  crucial  moments  of  history  are 
not   found   in   the   hours    in   which    armies 


What  is  Life?  139 

charge.  They  are  in  the  still,  small  voices 
of  the  inner  life  of  man.  The  shriek  of  shells 
and  the  shout  of  hosts  are  but  their  sequence. 

Search  for  the  hour  of  the  birth  of  modern 
civilization,  even  in  its  material  aspects,  and 
it  will  be  found  in  the  silence  of  a  lonely 
room,  where  a  solitary  man  sat  watching  the 
lid  of  a  tea-kettle  rise  and  fall.  From  that 
hour  flowed  the  history  of  a  century  of  pro- 
gress—the wonders  of  the  age  of  steam. 

These  hours  of  stillness  and  light  are  the 
secret  sources  of  the  wealth  of  life.  No  man 
who  is  without  them  can  live  or  maintain  his 

sanity. 

A  Western  train  on  which  I  was  travelling 
one  day  suddenly  shot  forward  at  breakneck 
speed.  Around  dangerous  curves  we  plunged, 
dashing  the  passengers  from  side  to  side. 
On  past  a  station  we  swept,  through  an 
excited  village,  and  disappeared  in  a  cloud 
of  dust.  No  signal  to  stop  was  heeded  in  the 
engine's  cab.     At  last  the  conductor  crawled 


140  The  Life  Worth  Living 

over  the  tender,  knocked  the  engineer  on  the 
head,  grasped  the  throttle  and  applied  the 
air  brakes.  The  engineer  had  gone  mad. 
Leaning  far  out  his  window,  his  hair  stream- 
ing in  the  wind,  his  eyes  set  on  the  track, 
he  was  muttering  unintelligible  words. 

Only  a  madman  rushes  forward  without 
pause.  The  soul  that  lives  must  have  hours 
of  silence  and  repose. 


THE    END 


;T 


